Legal Action

Berlin, May 22, 2024—Russian authorities must immediately halt their criminalization of journalists and independent media outlets by labeling them as “undesirable” and by issuing punitive sanctions against those they deem “foreign agents,” the Committee to Protect Journalists said Wednesday. On May 16, the prosecutor general’s office banned SOTA, one of Russia’s last independent news outlets,…

The Committee to Protect Journalists and nine other organizations representing news media titles, journalists, and campaign groups, urged U.K. authorities on Tuesday to urgently repeal Section 40 of the Crime and Courts Act 2013, which could force publishers to pay the costs of people who sue them — even if the outlet wins. Section 40,…

Stockholm, May 20, 2024—The Committee to Protect Journalists on Monday called on Kyrgyzstan to allow the country’s leading investigative news site Kloop to resume work and stop using the courts to silence critical media, following the rejection by a city court of Kloop’s appeal against a liquidation order. “The court’s rejection of Kloop’s appeal against…

Washington, D.C., May 20, 2024—The Committee to Protect Journalists welcomes the U.K. High Court’s Monday decision to allow WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange to appeal his extradition case. “We are heartened that WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange will be allowed to appeal his extradition to the United States,” said CPJ CEO Jodie Ginsberg, in New York. “Assange’s…

Istanbul, May 17, 2024—The Committee to Protect Journalists on Friday called on Syrian authorities to release detained Syrian journalist Mahmoud Ibrahim immediately and to disclose his location and that of all imprisoned journalists. On February 25, Syrian government forces arrested Ibrahim, an editor with Al-Thawra newspaper, which is published by the ruling Baath party, after…

Bangkok, May 16, 2024—Myanmar must drop all pending charges against detained Rakhine State reporter Htet Aung and stop using false allegations of terrorism to intimidate and jail reporters, the Committee to Protect Journalists said Thursday. Military authorities filed a terrorism charge against Htet Aung in January, in addition to an existing defamation charge, but his…

New Delhi, May 15, 2023—The Committee to Protect Journalists on Wednesday welcomed Indian court decisions to grant bail to journalists Aasif Sultan, Gautam Navlakha, and Prabir Purkayastha, who are being held under anti-terror laws, and called on the authorities to release all three men and immediately drop charges against them. “The Indian courts’ decisions to…

Update: A Serbian appeals court announced on September 11 that it has sent the extradition case of Belarusian filmmaker Andrey Gnyot for a third review to the Belgrade Higher Court. Gnyot told CPJ on September 12 that he expects the next hearing “will not happen earlier than a month,” saying that “the most dangerous thing” about the…

Update: A Guatemalan court ordered on May 15 that José Rubén Zamora be released to house arrest to await trial in the first of three cases against him. He was not immediately released as decisions remained pending in the other two cases.  Mexico City, May 14, 2024—The Committee to Protect Journalists calls upon Guatemalan authorities…

Bangkok, May 8, 2024—The Committee to Protect Journalists commends the conviction and sentencing of Joel Escorial, who confessed to shooting dead Philippine journalist Percival Mabasa in 2022. On Monday, May 6, Harold Cesar Huliganga, presiding judge at the Regional Trial Court Branch 254 in the city of Las Piñas, about 20 kilometers (12 miles) south…