(NO COUNTRY SUMMARY) June 17 Nicolas Giudici, Nice-Matin and Corse-Matin KILLED (motive unconfirmed) Giudici’s body was found in some bushes on the edge of a dirt track near the village of Piedriggio in northern Corsica on the morning of June 17. Giudici, 52, had been shot three times, in the left arm, chest and right…
With confounding ease, President Omar Bongo maintained his smooth-talking, iron-fisted rule by suppressing critical media voices via the Penal Code and by simply purchasing good press. In January, the president appropriated 500 million francs (US$690,000) to support private media outlets, causing reporters to engage in embarrassing public squabbles over how to divvy up the bounty.
Throughout the year, Gambian journalists feared that authoritarian president Yahya Jammeh and his ruling Alliance for Patriotic Reorientation and Construction (APRC) would deal harshly with journalists ahead of the October presidential elections. To the surprise of many, these fears proved misplaced. However, repression resumed soon after President Jammeh won reelection. One journalist was subsequently arrested…
Rife with corruption, organized crime, and political instability, Georgia is full of stories that are dangerous to tell. Journalists who dare to report on them risk reprisals, often from President Eduard Shevardnadze’s strong-armed government. Most chilling for journalists was the July murder of Georgy Sanaya, a popular, 26-year-old reporter for the Tbilisi-based independent television station…
After John Agyekum Kufuor was sworn in as Ghana’s new president in January, he promised to make defamation a civil and not a criminal offense. On July 27, Ghana’s parliament unanimously repealed the country’s criminal libel and sedition laws, including clauses governing sedition and defamation of the president. Also scrapped were laws granting the president…
Amid harassment and violence against journalists, human rights activists, and judges involved in high-profile cases, Guatemala’s political stability deteriorated considerably in 2001, and press freedom along with it. The administration of President Alfonso Portillo Cabrera, a member of the right-wing Guatemalan Republican Front (FRG), showed little tolerance for criticism of any kind.
The popular opposition leader Alpha Conde was released in late March, after serving three years of a five-year sentence for allegedly endangering national security. Conde’s release raised expectations that political change was coming to Guinea. But President Lassana Conté, who has ruled the country for nearly two decades, saw matters differently, plotting tirelessly to strengthen…
The government of Guinea-Bissau remained paralyzed for most of the year following a split in the governing coalition that left the ruling Social Renewal Party (PRS) in the minority amid widespread allegations of official corruption and mismanagement. Unable to create stability in the country, President Kumba Yala resorted to an increasingly dictatorial style that pitted…
Haiti’s press suffered a crackdown this year that coincided with the February inauguration of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide and continued after an apparent December coup attempt that sought to oust him. On December 17, about two dozen gunmen stormed the National Palace at dawn. At least 13 people were killed in the attack and ensuing mob…
The independent press faced pressure from the government of President Carlos Roberto Flores Facussé. Powerful politicians dominated the media during the November 2001 presidential elections, while small political parties received little coverage and had very limited access to the press. Both the National Party (PN) and the ruling Liberal Party (PL) flooded radio and TV…