Mission Journal: Duterte leads tri-pronged attack on press amid condemnation of controversial policies
Pia Randa is in Philippine leader Rodrigo Duterte’s crosshairs. At presidential press conferences, Duterte has repeatedly singled out the reporter by name and referred to Rappler, the news site where she works, as “fake news” and her reporting as “corrupt” and “biased” against his administration.
Sri Lankan politicians try to intimidate journalists over New York Times report
Washington, D.C., July 3, 2018–The Committee to Protect Journalists today called on opposition politicians in Sri Lanka to stop trying to intimidate local journalists by publicly leveling accusations against them. At a press conference yesterday evening, associates of former President Mahinda Rajapaksa accused two journalists for The New York Times of being tools of the…
Alleged killer of Capital Gazette employees had made repeated threats
New York, June 29, 2018–A gunman shot to death five people in the newsroom of the Capital Gazette in Annapolis, Maryland, yesterday afternoon in what police called a “targeted attack,” the newspaper reported. Police arrested Jarrod Ramos, 38, and charged him with five counts of first-degree murder, the paper said, citing court documents. He had…
CPJ Safety Advisory: Covering elections in Mexico
On July 1, 2018, Mexico will hold elections for the presidency and congress, as over 3,400 local and state offices in 30 of Mexico’s 32 states are contested. More than 100 candidates and incumbents have been killed during the electoral cycle, according to the privately owned Mexico City-based consultancy company, Etellekt, which is monitoring electoral…
Armed attackers rob, threaten Nicaraguan reporter in his home
Two armed men broke into the home of newspaper reporter Josué Garay in the Nicaraguan capital of Managua early on June 10, 2018, beat him and stole his phone and identification documents, the journalist told CPJ by phone. Garay told CPJ he believes the attack was an attempt to intimidate him and discourage him from…
HuffPost journalist and colleagues receive online threats
At least 11 journalists at HuffPost, their families and others were harassed and threatened online in late May and early June 2018, Lydia Polgreen, editor in chief at HuffPost, told CPJ. The harassment came after the outlet published a piece written by reporter Luke O’Brien that identified the person behind a Twitter account that shares…
Inter-American Court of Human Rights orders Colombia to investigate journalist’s murder
Bogotá, Colombia, June 8, 2018–The Committee to Protect Journalists today welcomed an historic ruling by the Inter-American Court of Human Rights that ordered the Colombian government to uphold its responsibility to investigate the 1998 murder of radio journalist Nelson Carvajal Carvajal.
In Ghana, investigative film crew faces death threats, harassment
New York, June 4, 2018–The Committee to Protect Journalists today called on Ghanaian member of parliament Kennedy Agyapong to stop threatening investigative journalist Anas Aremeyaw Anas and those perceived as close to his undercover investigative film, “Number 12,” about corruption and football in Ghana.
Radio host in northeastern Brazil subject to series of threats
Brazilian community radio presenter José Ilton dos Santos told the Committee to Protect Journalists that to date in 2018 he has faced a failed kidnapping attempt in which the assailant threatened to kill him as well as two other threats, the most recent coming on April 13, 2018. Dos Santos described the incidents to CPJ…
In India, Kashmiri photojournalist faces harassment, threats
Masrat Zahra, a Kashmiri freelance photographer, told CPJ that she faced online harassment and threats after a photograph of her, captioned with the word “mukhbir”–meaning “spy” or “army informer”–was circulated on social media around May 16, 2018.