Your Excellency: The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has welcomed news of the release of Syrian journalist and human rights activist Nizar Nayyouf, who was taken from prison to his parents’ home on the night of May 6 after serving nine years of a 10-year sentence. This action is a very positive step, although it is long overdue, particularly since Nayyouf has suffered severe health problems in prison.
Belgrade, May 8, 2001 In response to new challenges faced by the independent media in post-Milosevic Serbia, Kati Marton, a board member of the U.S.-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), met for two days of consultations with journalists and government officials in Belgrade. “We are very happy that there is a new atmosphere of…
New York, May 7, 2001 — The Committee to Protect Journalists today welcomed the release of Syrian journalist and human rights activist Nizar Nayyouf, who was taken by police from prison to his parents’ home Sunday night after serving nine years of a 10-year sentence for his conviction of membership in an unauthorized organization and…
New York, May 3, 2001 ƒ The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) received a message from imprisoned Iranian journalist Mashallah Shamsolvaezin to his “colleagues all over the world” on World Press Freedom Day, May 3, the same day that CPJ placed the man responsible for Shamsolvaezin’s imprisonment, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, at the top…
New York, May 2, 2001 – The Liberian Government announced on April 27 that media reports on fighting in the north of the country and on other issues of national security should be cleared with the Ministry of Information before publication or broadcast. According to a report by Agence France-Presse, the statement issued by Information…
New York, May 1, 2001 — Four unidentified gunmen on motorcycles shot and killed Colombian journalist Flavio Bedoya as he stepped off a bus around midday April 27 in the southwestern port city of Tumaco, police and colleagues said. Bedoya, 52, was a regional correspondent for the Bogotá-based Communist Party newspaper Voz. He had worked…
Your Excellency: The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), an independent organization dedicated to the defense of press freedom around the world, is deeply concerned about the takeover by Gazprom-Media of news outlets previously owned by the Media-Most company. Gazprom-Media is a subsidiary of Gazprom, a state-run gas monopoly.
Honorable Members of Parliament: The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), a non-governmental organization of journalists devoted to upholding press freedom worldwide, is concerned about draft Penal Code amendments, now under discussion in Parliament, that would substantially increase criminal penalties for defamation.
New York, April 27, 2001 — The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) is gravely concerned about the safety of two South African journalists who have been subpoenaed to testify against a murderous vigilante group that has threatened to kill them if they comply. In August 1996, journalist Kobus Louwrens and photographer Christo Lötter, both from…
Your Excellency: The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) is writing to protest the wounding of journalist Layla Odeh by IDF gunfire last Friday in the Gaza Strip. At about 1 p.m. on April 20, Odeh, a correspondent for the United Arab Emirates-based Abu Dhabi TV, was shot by Israeli troops while she and two colleagues were on assignment in the town of Rafah. At the time of the shooting, the journalists told CPJ, they were interviewing and filming local residents whose homes had been destroyed by Israeli forces.