Shabelle Media Network director Hassan Osman Abdi, better known locally as “Hassan Fantastic,” was gunned down outside his Mogadishu home at 6:30 p.m. today, Reporters Without Borders has learned from its partner organization in Somalia, the National Union of Somali Journalists (NUSOJ).
The annual report of the National Union of Somali Journalists, a partner organization of Reporters Without Borders, paints a worrying picture of abuses suffered by the media in 2011 and condemns the silence and impunity that surround crimes against journalists.
The report on the state of press freedom, published yesterday, said 2011 was worse than 2010 and lists four journalists killed, seven wounded and 19 arbitrarily arrested, as well as seven attacks on media organizations and at least five prosecutions for criminal defamation.
Reporters Without Borders and its partner organization, the Burma Media Association, hail the release of a number of journalists and bloggers under an amnesty announced today.
Journalists working for the Burmese exile radio and TV station Democratic Voice of Burma (DVB) have confirmed that all DVB journalists, including Hla Hla Win, Ngwe Soe Lin, Win Maw, Sithu Zeya and his father U Zeya, two freelance journalists (Thant Zin Aung and Zaw Thet Htwe) and the blogger Nay Phone Latt are among those who have been released.
Reporters Without borders is relieved to learn that the broadcast signal of the French public radio station Radio France Internationale, switched off on 31 December on the orders of the Congolese communications minister, Lambert Mende, was restored today.
The suspension of broadcasts by the station, which was criticised for its coverage of the events since the disputed presidential election last month, had aroused international protests, notably from France and the United States.
Reporters Without Borders condemns the shutdown of broadcasts by the French public radio station Radio France Internationale ordered by the authorities in the Democratic Republic of Congo and calls for their immediate restoration.
The press freedom organization also condemned the government’s failure to follow correct procedures and the methods used to take the station off the air.
December was a particularly black month for media freedom violations in Yemen although President Ali Abdallah Saleh agreed to a plan proposed by Gulf Cooperation Council in Riyadh on 23 November under which he is to stand down as president in February.
Reporters Without Borders firmly condemns the continuing violations and urges the international community to intercede. December was above all marked by violence by government troops and Saleh supporters against journalists covering the “March for Life,” which set off from Taiz, a city 270 km south of the capital, on 20 December.
Reporters Without Borders deplores the still poisonous climate for the media in the Democratic Republic of Congo nearly a month after the 28 November general elections. In addition to security problems when covering campaign meetings before the elections and protest meetings since, journalists are now being detained and questioned and media are being suspended.
66 journalists killed (16% more than in 2010)
1,044 journalists arrested
1,959 journalists physically attacked or threatened
499 media censored
71 journalists kidnapped
73 journalists fled their country
5 netizens killed
199 bloggers and netizens arrested
62 bloggers and netizens physically attacked
68 countries subject to Internet censorship
Reporters Without Borders is outraged that an Addis Ababa court today found Swedish journalists Johan Persson and Martin Schibbye guilty of supporting terrorism, a charge for which the prosecution has requested a 13-year jail sentence. They are also facing an additional sentence of five and a half years in prison on a charge of entering the country illegally, to which they pleaded guilty. The court is expected to issue a sentence next week.
Afghan organizations and Reporters Without Borders call for a clear commitment from Bonn conference to support freedom of expression and information.
A decade after the removal of the Taliban government, journalists’ unions and organizations that support open media in Afghanistan, together with Reporters Without Borders, call on the Kabul government and international diplomats to give a clear commitment to freedom of speech and information, as delegates prepare for the second international conference on the country’s future in Bonn next month.
Journalists are still being targeted as clashes continue in the streets around Cairo’s Tahrir Square. Although the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces has promised to bring forward the handover to a civilian government, the demonstrators are demanding the immediate departure of Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi and his transition government.
With attacks on journalists and media continuing in the final run-up to the 28 November presidential and parliamentary elections and an opposition parliamentarian’s murder in Kinshasa adding to the tension, Reporters Without Borders appeals again to all parties to do their best to ensure that the elections are not marred by violence and that media freedom is respected.
Reporters Without Borders condemns the accelerating deterioration in the media freedom situation in Egypt in the run-up to the 28 November elections. In the latest development, the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces ordered a 15-day extension to blogger and activist Alaa Abdel Fattah’s pre-trial detention on 13 November.
The Supreme Council has constantly restricted freedom of information ever since President Hosni Mubarak’s removal on 11 February. It has summoned journalists and bloggers before military courts and has convicted and jailed netizens.
Reporters Without Borders reiterates its concern about the fate of journalists and bloggers who have disappeared or who have been kidnapped of the course of the past nine months of protests against Bashar Al-Assad’s government. The list keeps getting longer.
Lina Ibrahim, a reporter for the pro-government newspaper Tishreen, has been missing for the past eight days. A relative said she left her home in the Damascus suburb of Harasta on the morning of 25 October and never returned.
Reporters Without Borders is alarmed by a dangerous increase in acts of violence and intimidation against radio and TV stations and newspapers since the first round of Liberia’s presidential election on 11 October. Election rivalry has exacerbated tension between the media and the candidates’ political parties.
Reporters Without Borders opened a bureau in Tunis on 12th October. Its staff will have the job of raising media freedom violations with the Tunisian authorities and helping to build and develop stable, professional and independent media in Tunisia.
Reporters Without Borders is very worried by the desire being expressed by Kyrgyzstan’s parliamentarians to assert their control over the media and, in particular, by the impact of a law banning direct retransmission of all foreign TV stations in the run-up to the 30 October presidential election.
Reporters Without Borders fails to understand a decision by the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) to urge countries that have given asylum to Rwandan refugees to withdraw their refugee status by the middle of next year on the grounds that political life in Rwanda is back to normal.
(RSF/IFEX) - 6 October 2011 - Reporters Without Borders is worried by the Hamas interior ministry's adoption of new rules that will make it harder for foreign journalists to visit the Gaza Strip.
Under the new rules, adopted on 25 September, every foreigner wanting to enter the Gaza Strip via the Rafah and Erez crossings will have to apply in an advance to the interior ministry in Gaza. Processing the application could take several days.
