Journalism: a dangerous job, and oft well done (5)

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Journalism: a dangerous job, and oft well done (5)

1aspirit
Bearbeitet: Jan. 8, 2021, 6:01 pm

The topic is news of journalists being attacked throughout the world.

American news is currently focused on yesterday's attack on the US Capitol building. The POTUS-directed "rioters" threatened journalists and grabbed their equipment during the assault. (Started in the previous thread.)

"Inside a Harrowing Day at the Capitol" shared the experiences of NYT reporters.

They saw that my ID said The New York Times and became really angry. They threw me to the floor, trying to take my cameras. I started screaming for help as loudly as I could. No one came. People just watched. At this point, I thought I could be killed.

2aspirit
Jan. 8, 2021, 6:27 pm

"Are you Antifa?"
"He's not. He's not."

Video: https://www.instagram.com/tv/CJxKMArpN0_/?igshid=1gieqy5188vry

Caption:
julythephotoguy: A gopro video shows my apnews colleague and teammate John Minchillo being attacked by President Donald Trump supporters as we cover protesters clashing with Capitol Police yesterday. Thankfully, he wasn’t injured. He was labeled as an anti protesters, even though he kept flashing his press credentials, and one person can be heard threatening to kill him. This is an unedited, real life situation of a member of the press keeping his cool even though he was being attacked.

3John5918
Jan. 8, 2021, 10:52 pm

A positive step for Julian Assange but a blow to press freedom (CPJ)

A London court’s decision this week not to extradite WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange to the United States imperils press freedom even as it benefits Assange.

In her January 4 decision, Judge Vanessa Baraister ruled that Assange would be at risk of suicide should he be extradited to the U.S. to face criminal prosecution, including on espionage charges. But she did not outright reject the Justice Department’s case against Assange, which press freedom advocates, including CPJ, say criminalizes some newsgathering practices. On January 6 the same judge denied Assange bail.

“The ruling’s protection is limited to Assange himself. It’s not going to help the next journalist or publisher”...

4John5918
Bearbeitet: Jan. 9, 2021, 1:08 am

Zimbabwe journalist Hopewell Chin'ono arrested for third time in six months (Guardian)

Police in Zimbabwe have arrested the prominent journalist Hopewell Chin‘ono, for the third time in six months, his lawyer said...


CPJ joins call for Guatemalan authorities to drop criminal charges against journalist Anastasia Mejía (CPJ)

The Committee to Protect Journalists today joined 50 human rights organizations, media outlets, and individuals in a statement calling on Guatemalan authorities to drop all remaining charges against Indigenous radio journalist Anastasia Mejía Tiriquiz. Mejía is facing charges of sedition and aggravated attack for her alleged participation in an August 24, 2020, demonstration, according to the statement. Police arrested Mejía on September 22 for allegedly joining in that protest against a local mayor, as CPJ documented at the time. She was held at a detention center in Quetzaltenango for five weeks until being released pending trial...

5John5918
Jan. 11, 2021, 11:48 am

Colombian journalist Andrés Felipe Guevara shot and killed (CPJ)

On December 21, 2020, in the western city of Cali, an unidentified assailant shot Guevara four times while he was talking with a friend in front of his home, according to news reports. Guevara was shot in his chest, stomach, and leg, and was hospitalized following the attack; he died of his wounds on December 23, according to news reports. The journalist’s friend was shot in the buttocks and survived, the reports said. Guevara, 27, covered crime for the daily newspaper Q’hubo Cali, according to those reports...


Nicaraguan journalist Aníbal Toruño harassed, home raided (CPJ)

Yesterday, national police officers raided Toruño’s home in the northwestern city of León, and broke the home’s front door and other furniture... Police did not present a warrant for the raid, and did not confiscate anything from the home... Toruño said that it was the second time police had raided his home in a week, after officers broke into his home on January 4, saying they were looking for guns and drugs, which they did not find, and threatened one of Toruño’s domestic workers, saying she worked for a drug dealer. Radio Darío is one of the few independent media outlets in the city of León, and covered protests against President Daniel Ortega’s government that started in April 2018...

6John5918
Bearbeitet: Jan. 12, 2021, 11:21 pm

Global media's Nigeria abductions coverage 'wrong' (BBC)

Nigerian novelist Adaobi Tricia Nwaubani criticises international media coverage of the abduction of schoolchildren in Nigeria - from that of the "Chibok girls" in 2014 to that of the "Kankara boys" last month...


Venezuelan authorities raid, shutter VPITV broadcaster (CPJ)

On January 8, authorities raided the Caracas offices of VPITV, an independent online broadcaster, where they confiscated cameras, computers, transmission equipment, and documents, and ordered the station to cease operations...

7John5918
Jan. 13, 2021, 10:58 pm

Is Britain's TV news at risk of being dominated by those who shout loudest? (Guardian)

There has long been an alignment of interests between those who despise the EU and those who despise the BBC for its publicly funded journalism. This confluence has also been demonstrated by British newspaper owners and their editors; now two new television ventures are providing a fresh outlet...

Much ink has been spilled over what this potential Foxification of the airwaves will do without much thought for the fact that the culture war over Britain and its place in the world has already been led by the UK’s rightwing press, most of which is owned by Rupert Murdoch and other Brexit-backing billionaires. The differences with the US are many, from the expectation of impartiality on TV, governed by regulation, to a print media that is far more opinionated than its US counterparts. What both countries share, however, is the tendency for the biggest billionaires to claim they speak on behalf of so-called ordinary people...

8John5918
Jan. 14, 2021, 12:13 pm

CPJ Safety Advisory: Covering the build-up to the U.S. presidential inauguration

Journalists should be prepared for the risk of hostility and violence from such militia groups, protesters, and the police. Since May 2020, there have been hundreds of reported incidents of violence and harassment targeting journalists covering protests, as well as arrests...


Investigative outlet Repórter Brasil targeted with cyberattacks, threats, attempted break-in

From January 6 to 12, unidentified internet users orchestrated a distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack on the website of Repórter Brasil, an investigative reporting and human rights organization, flooding the page with web traffic and forcing it offline multiple times, according to a statement by the outlet and its director... Following the commencement of the attack January 6, and then again on January 8, the outlet’s general contact email account received anonymous messages demanding that Repórter Brasil remove all its reporting from 2003 to 2005, or else face further attacks...


Both from CPJ

9John5918
Jan. 14, 2021, 10:55 pm

Russian regulator announces fines for RFE/RL outlets under expanded ‘foreign agent’ law

On January 12, Roskomnadzor, the country’s media regulator, issued four notices to media outlets run by the U.S. Congress-funded broadcaster Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, and four personal notices to Andrey Shary, the general director of the RFE/RL’s legal entity in Russia, as the person responsible for each outlet... The notices allege that the four outlets—Radio Liberty, Current Time TV, and the regional news websites Sibir.Realii and Idel.Realii—failed to label their content as “foreign agent-produced,” a violation of Russia’s foreign agents law, according to news reports and the regulator’s statement...


Turkish police raid Etkin News Agency, arrest reporter Pınar Gayıp

Last night, police raided the Istanbul office of the Etkin News Agency, a news outlet supportive of the Socialist Party of the Oppressed, according to news reports and a report by the outlet. During the raid, police broke the front door of the news agency’s office and searched its premises, seizing camera memory cards, computer hard drives, and 6,600 Turkish lira (US$893) in cash from the office, according to those reports. Also last night, police arrested Gayıp, a reporter with the agency, at her home in Istanbul, and sought to arrest editor İsminaz Temel, but could not find her...


Both from CPJ

10John5918
Jan. 15, 2021, 11:18 pm

Turkish journalist Orhan Uğuroğlu attacked in Ankara (CPJ)

Earlier today, in Ankara, the capital, three unidentified men attacked Uğuroğlu, the Ankara correspondent for the nationalist daily Yeniçağ, while he was getting into his car at his home, according to a report by his employer and news reports. The men attacked Uğuroğlu and attempted to run him over with their car, but the journalist escaped with only a minor injury to his elbow...

11John5918
Jan. 16, 2021, 11:05 am

James Murdoch says US media 'lies' unleashed 'insidious forces' (Guardian)

Son of Fox News owner Rupert Murdoch issues excoriating rebuke following storming of the Capitol...

12John5918
Jan. 20, 2021, 5:43 am

Biden administration 'to declassify report' into Khashoggi murder (Guardian)

The Biden administration will declassify an intelligence report into the murder by the Saudi government of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, according to Avril Haines, who has been nominated to serve as director of national intelligence. The decision means that the US is likely to officially assign blame for Khashoggi’s brutal murder to the kingdom’s de facto ruler, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman...


Russian journalist Dmitry Timoshenko repeatedly arrested, fined over protest coverage

Police in the eastern city of Khabarovsk have detained Timoshenko, a correspondent for the independent regional newspaper Arsenievskie Vesti, three times since January 16 while he covered protests in the city; he was most recently arrested this afternoon and remains in custody...


Deportation for Iranian journalist Mohammad Mosaed ‘not on the table’ in Turkey, official says

Iranian journalist Mohamed Mosaed has requested asylum in Turkey, his lawyer Canan Pehlivan told the Committee Protect Journalist today. CPJ is calling on Turkish authorities to conduct an expedited review of his request, as Mosaed faces imprisonment in Iran in reprisal for his journalism. Pehlivan told CPJ that Mosaed will be held at a Turkish migration center for the next 14 days, pursuant to the country’s COVID-19 regulations, and that Turkish officials had assured her that her client would not face deportation. That position was affirmed in a statement attributable to a senior Turkish security official—emailed yesterday to The New York Times and shared with CPJ–who said that Mosaed applied for international protection and that deportation “is not on the table”...


Portuguese police surveilled, interrogated journalists in leak investigation

From April to June 2018, as part of a bribery investigation into executives of a local soccer team, the Lisbon public prosecutor’s office ordered police to secretly surveil four reporters in an effort to uncover sources for their coverage of that case...


The last three from CPJ.

13John5918
Jan. 20, 2021, 10:41 pm

Inter-American Commission on Human Rights orders Colombia to protect journalist Ricardo Calderón (CPJ)

Yesterday, the commission made public a resolution, dated January 14, determining that Calderón faced “grave and imminent” danger from threats and surveillance by the Colombian military and other sources due to his reporting, and ordered officials to adopt the necessary measures to protect Calderón’s life and allow him to continue working safely. Under the regulations of the Organization of American States, which operates the commission and of which Colombia is a member, the Colombian government is required to follow the commission’s recommendations and report back on its efforts...

14John5918
Jan. 21, 2021, 10:48 pm

Russian authorities warn journalists, social media platforms, and news outlets ahead of pro-Navalny protests

Since yesterday, police and the country’s media regulator have issued warnings to at least four journalists, as well as to news outlets and social media platforms, discouraging them from covering protests in support of jailed opposition leader Alexei Navalny...


Argentine municipal government files criminal complaint over journalist’s COVID-19 vaccine reporting

On January 13, the municipality of Quilmes, a city in Buenos Aires province, filed a criminal complaint to a federal court over Carrigall’s reporting on the municipal government’s alleged mishandling of the coronavirus vaccine...


Both from CPJ

15John5918
Jan. 26, 2021, 10:15 am

Journalist Marilú Capa shot, severely injured in Ecuador (CPJ)

At about 8 a.m. on January 19, in the northeastern town of Nueva Loja, an unidentified man entered a restaurant that Capa owns and shot her six times with a pistol... The attacker then fled the scene on a motorcycle driven by a second unidentified man...

16John5918
Jan. 27, 2021, 11:01 pm

Russian police detain, beat, and harass dozens of journalists covering pro-Navalny protests (CPJ)

On January 23, police in at least 20 cities throughout Russia detained, beat, and otherwise interfered with the work of at least 58 journalists, assaulting at least 8 and detaining at least 49, while they were covering protests in support of the opposition leader and anti-corruption blogger Alexei Navalny...

17John5918
Jan. 28, 2021, 10:50 pm

Russian journalist Ruslan Totrov beaten in North Ossetia (CPJ)

On January 21, two men entered Totrov’s office in Vladikavkaz, the capital of North Ossetia, and attacked the journalist while he was in a studio recording a video blog... The men hit Totrov in the face, cutting his lip and breaking two of his teeth, while threatening to kill him if he did not stop writing “nasty things and lies about their ‘brother,’ South Ossetia President Anatoly Bibilov”...

18John5918
Jan. 29, 2021, 11:44 pm

UK Minister under fire over tweets about journalist who sent her questions (Guardian)

A government minister is facing criticism after publicly accusing a journalist of “making up claims” and creating disinformation for asking questions about a video campaign promoting the coronavirus vaccine programme. In a Twitter thread, Kemi Badenoch accused the journalist from HuffPost of “creepy and bizarre” behaviour, and published screenshots of questions sent to her MP’s office and to a ministerial press office, naming the reporter. In the wake of the tweets, the journalist concerned, Nadine White, had been forced to make her own Twitter account private as she was receiving so much abuse, HuffPost said...

19John5918
Jan. 30, 2021, 11:06 pm

Arrest of photographer at Kent protest raises press freedom fears (Guardian)

Concern is growing over press freedom following the arrest of a photographer after he took and shared photos of a protest at a former military barracks controversially housing asylum seekers...

Aitchison spent several minutes covering the brief protest... Five police officers arrived at Aitchison’s nearby home six hours later and arrested him on suspicion of criminal damage, in front of his children. In an interview with the Guardian, he said: “I really feel like they’re trying to clamp down on the freedom of the press"...

20John5918
Bearbeitet: Feb. 3, 2021, 1:30 am

Russian police detain or harass more than 100 journalists amid January 31 pro-Navalny protests (CPJ)

During nationwide protests by supporters of jailed opposition leader Alexei Navalny on January 31, as well as in their immediate run-up, police throughout the country detained, intimidated, or harassed at least 122 journalists...


To police, ‘the camera is like a red cloth to a bull’: four journalists on covering Russia’s pro-Navalny protests (CPJ)

Law enforcement officers detained, beat, and otherwise interfered with the work of dozens of journalists covering protests in at least 20 cities...


South Sudan: Rampant abusive surveillance by NSS instils climate of fear (Amnesty International)

South Sudan’s National Security Service (NSS) is using abusive surveillance to terrorize journalists, activists and critics, leading to a climate of intense fear and self-censorship, Amnesty International said in a new report...

21John5918
Feb. 3, 2021, 11:21 pm

Why journalists in India are under attack (BBC)

A month after taking office in the summer of 2014, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said India's "democracy will not sustain if we can't guarantee freedom of speech and expression". Six years on, many believe, India's democracy looks diminished, by what they say are persistent attacks on the freedom of the press. Last year India dropped two places and was ranked 142 on the 180-country World Press Freedom Index...

22John5918
Feb. 5, 2021, 12:06 am

Staff outraged at New York Times response to reporter's racist language (Guardian)

More than 150 New York Times staffers sent a letter on Wednesday to its executive leadership criticizing the paper’s response to complaints from parents that the journalist Donald McNeil Jr had used racist language while on a company-sponsored student trip, and for the handling of the scandal once those complaints were first reported. “Our community is outraged and in pain,” staffers wrote, adding that despite the paper’s “seeming commitment to diversity and inclusion, {they’ve} given a prominent platform – a critical beat covering a pandemic disproportionately affecting people of color – to someone who chose to use language that is offensive and unacceptable by any newsroom’s standards”...


Mexico: ex-governor arrested for allegedly ordering torture of journalist (Guardian)

Mexican authorities have arrested a former state governor on charges that he ordered the illegal arrest and torture of a prominent reporter who investigated his protection of a paedophile ring...


Police attack journalists with tear gas and rubber bullets at Istanbul protest (CPJ)

Yesterday, Istanbul police in the city’s Kadıköy district fired tear gas at journalists covering student protests against a new university rector, and shot at least two members of the press with rubber bullets...


Kazakh police detain, harass editor of independent weekly Uralskaya Nedelya (CPJ)

On February 1, police in the Abai district of the western city of Uralsk summoned Akhmedyarov, chief editor of independent weekly newspaper Uralskaya Nedelya, and interrogated him about an investigative report on alleged local corruption he published on November 27, 2020, and asked him to reveal his sources, which he refused to do...


Journalist Valery Vorotnik assaulted in Ukraine (CPJ)

On February 2, in the central city of Cherkasy, two men entered the editorial office of the independent broadcaster Antena TV, where Vorotnik works as chief editor, and beat him to the point of losing consciousness... Vorotnik said that the men punched and kicked him in the head, causing him to pass out, and also destroyed a camera that was on his desk. Vitaly Hrebinets, an editor and video producer at the station who witnessed the attack, told CPJ via messaging app that one of the attackers then threatened to kill Vorotnik if he “says something bad” about him, and then they both left the scene. Hrebinets and Vorotnik identified one of the attackers, the man who made the threat, as Stanislav Kolomiets, an official at the Cherasky city council...

23John5918
Bearbeitet: Feb. 6, 2021, 12:11 am

>19 John5918:

UK Police drop case against photographer at Kent barracks protest (Guardian)

Press freedom concerns raised over arrest of Andy Aitchison after he documented Napier barracks protest...

24John5918
Feb. 6, 2021, 12:19 am

UK expelled Chinese journalists 'working as spies' (BBC)

Three journalists who were allegedly working as spies for China were asked to leave the UK last year. Their departure, first reported by the Daily Telegraph, came because they had arrived under journalism visas but were believed to be working for the Ministry of State Security, part of China's intelligence apparatus. Their departure was low-key...

25John5918
Feb. 6, 2021, 11:52 pm

Two New York Times journalists leave paper over different controversies (Guardian)

Two New York Times journalists have left the paper over separate controversies involving racist and sexist behavior, including its high-profile Covid-19 reporter Donald McNeil, following disclosures about his use of a racist slur while on a company-sponsored student trip.

The departures of McNeil and audio journalist, Andy Mills, a co-creator of the Daily podcast and a producer and co-host of the now partially retracted Caliphate podcast, come amid a wider reckoning across over racism and abusive behavior within American newsrooms...

26John5918
Bearbeitet: Feb. 8, 2021, 11:16 pm

Uzbek blogger Otabek Sattoriy detained, charged with extortion (CPJ)

On January 30, in the southern city of Termez, a group of plain-clothed police officers detained Sattoriy, a blogger who covers alleged local corruption on his Telegram and YouTube accounts, both named Xalq Fikri (“The People’s Opinion”)...


Belarus journalists Katsiaryna Andreyeva and Darya Chultsova to face trial over protest reporting (CPJ)

Andreyeva, a correspondent for the Poland-based independent broadcaster Belsat TV, and Chultsova, a camera operator for the outlet, will appear tomorrow before a judge in the Frunzensky District Court of Minsk, the capital, according to news reports and Barys Haretski, deputy head of the Belarusian Association of Journalists, an independent press freedom and trade group, who spoke with CPJ via messaging app. The two are charged with “organizing and preparing actions that grossly violate public order,” which authorities allege they committed while covering mass protests over the disputed August 2020 reelection of President Aleksandr Lukashenko, according to those sources. If convicted, they could face up to three years in jail, according to Belarusian law...


UK editors call on ministers to protect freedom of information (Guardian)

Open letter raises concerns public is being obstructed when requesting information from official files...


Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai to remain in jail as landmark security law case continues (Guardian)

Hong Kong media mogul and pro-democracy activist Jimmy Lai will remain in jail after the city’s highest court sided with authorities to keep him in jail pending further legal arguments, in the first real legal challenge to the national security law...

27Doug1943
Feb. 10, 2021, 3:29 pm

>1 aspirit: The people who attacked the journalists from the New York Times should be prosecuted under the law.
The journalists themselves should get an Andy Ngo Award https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andy_Ngo, and be allowed to get back to the NYT to join in the white-supremacist hunt fun there. Quillette.com

28John5918
Bearbeitet: Feb. 10, 2021, 11:25 pm

Russian blogger jailed for 25 days over coverage of Navalny protests, hospitalized after hunger strike (CPJ)

On January 28, plain-clothed law enforcement officers detained Bairov near his home in Ulan-Ude, a city in the eastern Russian Republic of Buryatia, according to news reports and Bairov’s wife, Yekaterina Bartayeva... During his detention, approximately five officers ran up to Bairov, pushed him to the ground, and forcefully twisted his arms, dislocating his left arm, according to Bartayeva, who witnessed the raid, and those reports. Later that day, the Sovetskiy District Court found Bairov guilty of “repeated violation of the law on mass events,” and sentenced him to 25 days of detention for his alleged participation in a January 23 rally in support of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny in Ulan-Ude...


'This used to be your favourite show': Polish media stage blackout protest (Guardian)

Commercial TV channels, radio stations and web portals have gone off air in Poland in protest at tax proposals that critics say threaten independent media, a day after Hungary’s leading private radio station lost its broadcasting licence. The European commission on Wednesday expressed concern for media freedom in the two countries, both of whose governments have been accused of acting to stifle opposition outlets and are under investigation for alleged rule-of-law violations. Polish private media, much of which is highly critical of the nationalist ruling Law and Justice (PiS) party, ran slogans such as “This used to be your favourite show” and “Media without choice” to highlight the planned tax on their advertising revenues...

29John5918
Feb. 11, 2021, 11:29 pm

China bans BBC World News in retaliation for UK licence blow (Guardian)

China has been critical of BBC reports on Xinjiang, while Ofcom recently revoked CGTN licence...

30John5918
Bearbeitet: Feb. 14, 2021, 11:20 am

Journalists Alvarez Destiné and Méus Jeanril shot as police and armed forces disperse protest in Haiti (CPJ)

Yesterday afternoon, in the Champs-des-Mars area of Port-au-Prince, the capital, unidentified attackers shot Destiné and Jeanril while they were covering protests calling for President Jovenel Moïse to step down... The shootings occurred as members of the Haitian National Police and the Armed Forces fired live ammunition to disperse demonstrators...


‘Radio stations in South Sudan practice self-censorship’ (Radio Tamazuj)

For the past two years or so we are realizing some improvement in press freedom. Journalists have a right now and they are talking. For the past three months, we have never heard about any incident of arrest or detention. This is because journalists themselves are now aware of what issues they can report about or not. This is the result of a lot of training awareness by the civil societies to journalists and organized forces. This is the reason that increased the level of press freedom. The media are now somehow enjoying their profession. And most journalists and media houses now know what topics that they can tackle or not...


TJ Ducklo: Biden aide quits over 'abhorrent' language (BBC)

White House deputy press secretary TJ Ducklo has resigned, a day after being suspended without pay for allegedly threatening a female reporter... "I used language that no woman should ever have to hear from anyone, especially in a situation where she was just trying to do her job. It was language that was abhorrent, disrespectful and unacceptable"...

31John5918
Bearbeitet: Feb. 17, 2021, 1:54 pm

Turkey sentences 4 Özgür Gündem journalists to jail on terror charges

Yesterday, the 23rd Istanbul Court of Serious Crimes convicted three former editors and the former publisher of pro-Kurdish daily Özgür Gündem on terrorism charges, and sentenced them to jail terms ranging from 25 months to more than six years...


Meet Mediazona, the punk rock-founded Russian news outlet whose editor was jailed for a tweet

Of the more than 100 Russian journalists who have been arrested or fined covering rallies in support of jailed opposition leader Alexei Navalny, Mediazona chief editor Sergey Smirnov has become a symbol of the absurd lengths to which Russian authorities are willing to go to quash coverage of the events...


Belarusian authorities raid Belarusian Association of Journalists headquarters, journalists’ homes

Today, police in Belarus raided the Minsk headquarters of the Belarusian Association of Journalists (BAJ), a local advocacy and trade group, and the apartments of two of BAJ’s employees... Police officers confiscated mobile phones, laptops, and money from the homes of BAJ deputy head Barys Haretski and the organization’s lawyer, Aleh Aheyeu...


All from CPJ

Edited to add: News Corp agrees deal with Google over payments for journalism (Guardian)

Google and Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp have signed a multi-year partnership that will lead to the search engine paying for journalism from news sites around the world, including the Wall Street Journal, the Times and the Australian...


Ugandan reporters covering rights petition beaten (BBC)

The security forces in Uganda have injured several journalists who were reporting on pop star-turned politician Bobi Wine delivering a petition to the UN highlighting human rights abuses in the country. Eyewitnesses said soldiers arrived in trucks outside the UN Human Rights Office in the capital, Kampala, and started beating the journalists with batons. One journalist tweeted photos from the scene, showing one colleague with blood pouring from a head wound...

32John5918
Feb. 17, 2021, 11:11 pm

Anonymous Telegram channel publishes financial information of Russian journalist Elena Solovyova (CPJ)

In several posts on February 4 and 10, the anonymous Telegram channel “Komi-Telega,” which has over 6,000 subscribers, published copies of Solovyova’s tax forms for work she did as a reporter for a number of media outlets, including U.S. Congress-funded broadcaster Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and Russian independent news website 7×7, and a copy of her work contract with RFE/RL... The posts called Solovyova, a freelance reporter based in the northwestern city of Syktyvkar in the Russian republic of Komi, a “foreign agent” and “parasite” involved in “dark financial deeds.” On February 13, the account posted that it would publish “more revelations” about the journalist. “Komi-Telega” frequently posts criticism of independent journalists and human rights activists, alleging that they have sold out to the West...


Mexican journalist Edgar Leyva in hiding after shooting attempt (CPJ)

On February 3, in Ocotlán, in the southern Mexican state of Oaxaca, two unidentified men in a car pulled up to a plot of land where Leyva, his sister, and his aunt were working, and asked for the journalist; when his aunt and sister approached the vehicle, the men opened fire... The journalist’s sister, Rosa Isela Leyva, and his aunt, Bernarda Ramírez, were killed in the attack, but he escaped unharmed, Leyva said. Leyva told CPJ he believed the men were trying to kill him...

33John5918
Feb. 18, 2021, 11:08 pm

2-year jail sentences for Belarus journalists Katsiaryna Andreyeva and Darya Chultsova (CPJ)

The Frunzensky District Court of Minsk, the capital, convicted Andreyeva, a correspondent for the Poland-based independent broadcaster Belsat TV, and Chultsova, a camera operator for the outlet, of “organizing and preparing actions that grossly violate public order” over their November 15, 2020, reporting on protests calling for the resignation of President Aleksandr Lukashenko... The journalists denied any wrongdoing, and Andreyeva said in a statement to the court that she believed the case was “politically motivated” and “retribution for my professional work”... The journalists were among the at least 10 members of the press detained in Belarus...

34John5918
Bearbeitet: Feb. 23, 2021, 11:06 pm

From today's Guardian:

Sky News Australia is tapping into the global conspiracy set – and it’s paying off

News Corp-owned channel is garnering millions of views across digital platforms with a slew of far-right conspiracies...


Boris Johnson says he feels guilty about his journalism

Boris Johnson quit journalism for politics because he felt guilty about “abusing or attacking people” without putting himself in their shoes...


Man guilty of Daphne Caruana Galizia murder given 15-year sentence

One of three men accused of planting and detonating the car bomb that killed the anti-corruption journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia in 2017 has pleaded guilty to the crime and been sentenced to 15 years in prison...

35John5918
Feb. 26, 2021, 10:02 am

Demonstrators attack 2 RFE/RL journalists at political protest in Armenia (CPJ)

On February 23, in Yerevan, the capital, a group of about 20 protesters harassed and assaulted Khulyan, a reporter with Azatutyun, the Armenian service of U.S. Congress-funded broadcaster Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, and Chilingaryan, a camera operator with the outlet...

36Limelite
Feb. 26, 2021, 2:12 pm

US Intel Report Directly Blames MSB for Approving Murder of Jamal Khashoggi

Crown Prince virtually controls Saudi security operations and no one would dare carry out so brutal a killing without his endorsement. Now that the truth is public, one question begs an answer. What will the Biden Administration do about it in terms of holding the Crown Prince accountable, as per the president's campaign promise?

Read the report here (.pdf).

37margd
Bearbeitet: Feb. 27, 2021, 3:21 am

New State Dept policy, Khashoggi Ban", is in spirit of Magnitsky Act?

State Department 'Khashoggi Ban' Restricts Visas for Those Who Target Journalists, Activists
Alexandra Hutzler | 2/26/21

The State Department on Friday announced a new policy, the "Khashoggi ban," that will allow the U.S. to impose visa restrictions on individuals who target journalists and dissidents on behalf of foreign governments.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a statement that the restrictions will focus on individuals who "are believed to have been directly engaged in serious, extraterritorial counter-dissident activities, including those that suppress, harass, surveil, threaten, or harm journalists, activists, or other persons perceived to be dissidents for their work."

...The spokesperson added that the policy "will give us an additional tool to promote a measure of accountability for those who act to harm journalists and perceived dissidents for their work. It will allow us to prevent bad actors from traveling to the United States by revoking and restricting issuance of visas."...

https://www.newsweek.com/state-department-khashoggi-ban-restricts-visas-those-wh...

---------------------------------------------------------

Accountability for the Murder of Jamal Khashoggi
Press Statement
Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State
February 26, 2021

...today I am announcing the “Khashoggi Ban,” a new visa restriction policy pursuant to section 212(a)(3)(C) of the Immigration and Nationality Act. The Khashoggi Ban allows the State Department to impose visa restrictions on individuals who, acting on behalf of a foreign government, are believed to have been directly engaged in serious, extraterritorial counter-dissident activities, including those that suppress, harass, surveil, threaten, or harm journalists, activists, or other persons perceived to be dissidents for their work, or who engage in such activities with respect to the families or other close associates of such persons. Family members of such individuals also may be subject to visa restrictions under this policy, where appropriate.

To start, the U.S. Department of State has taken action pursuant to the Khashoggi Ban to impose visa restrictions on 76 Saudi individuals believed to have been engaged in threatening dissidents overseas, including but not limited to the Khashoggi killing. When identifying individuals for purposes of the Khashoggi Ban, we will also review them for designation under Section 7031(c) of the Department of State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs Appropriations Act of 2020, as carried forward by the CA Act of 2021, which authorizes the denial of visas to them and their immediate family members as well as their public identification.

As a matter of safety for all within our borders, perpetrators targeting perceived dissidents on behalf of any foreign government should not be permitted to reach American soil.

I also have directed that the State Department fully report on any such extraterritorial activities by any government in our annual Country Reports on Human Rights Practices. The United States will continue to shine a light on any government that targets individuals, either domestically or extraterritorially, merely for exercising their human rights and fundamental freedoms.

While the United States remains invested in its relationship with Saudi Arabia, President Biden has made clear that partnership must reflect U.S. values. To that end, we have made absolutely clear that extraterritorial threats and assaults by Saudi Arabia against activists, dissidents, and journalists must end. They will not be tolerated by the United States.

https://www.state.gov/accountability-for-the-murder-of-jamal-khashoggi/

38John5918
Feb. 28, 2021, 12:01 am

BBC’s Sonja McLaughlan reveals online abuse over Owen Farrell interview (Guardian)

Sonja McLaughlan, the BBC rugby reporter, was the target of online abuse following the live broadcast of England’s 40-24 Six Nations defeat to Wales in Cardiff. McLaughlan’s robust questioning of England captain Owen Farrell and head coach Eddie Jones in the immediate aftermath led to a sustained series of insults directed at her account, tagged so that she would see them...

39John5918
Bearbeitet: Mrz. 2, 2021, 12:02 am

Ethiopia's Tigray crisis: BBC reporter Girmay Gebru detained by military (BBC)

The BBC reporter in Ethiopia's conflict-hit region of Tigray has been detained by the military. Witnesses say Girmay Gebru, who works for BBC Tigrinya, was taken along with four other people from a café in the regional capital, Mekelle. Mr Girmay is reported to have been taken to a military camp in Mekelle...


Guardian and Observer gain 33 National Press Awards nominations (Guardian)

The Guardian and the Observer have gained 33 nominations for the National Press Awards, with shortlist places for reporters, feature writers and commentators from across the two publications...

40John5918
Mrz. 2, 2021, 11:19 pm

Three female media workers shot dead in Afghanistan (Guardian)

Three women who worked for an Afghan television station have been shot dead in the eastern city of Jalalabad, the latest in a string of targeted assassinations that are increasingly overshadowing US-brokered attempts to negotiate an end to the country’s civil war. Zalmai Latifi, the director at Enikass TV, said the women worked in the station’s dubbing department and were killed in two separate attacks. “They are all dead. They were going home from the office on foot when they were shot,” he told Agence France-Presse. Another woman was injured in the shootings and taken to hospital, where she was in a critical condition...

41John5918
Mrz. 3, 2021, 11:17 pm

Georgian journalist Vakhtang Sanaia receives concussion from assault by 3 attackers

In the early hours of February 25 in Tbilisi, the capital, three unidentified men attacked Vakhtang Sanaia, an anchor at the local TV broadcaster Formula, who is also known as Vakho Sanaia... While the journalist was stopped on the side of the road with his family awaiting assistance due to car trouble, three passersby started insulting him and his broadcaster, and challenging him to a fight...Sanaia then slipped and fell, and two of the men hit and kicked him; they also punched one of his relatives... Sanaia said the men told him to “remember their faces” and threatened to kill him. People who were helping the journalist with his car intervened and stopped the scuffle, and police arrived and detained all three attackers...


Russian journalist Natalia Zubkova in hiding following attack, death threats

In the evening of February 25, an unidentified hooded man in dark clothes attacked and threatened Zubkova, the chief editor and founder of the independent news website Novosti Kiselyovska, outside her home in southwestern Siberian city of Kiselyovsk... The man approached the journalist from behind, grabbed her by the hood of her coat, and pushed her to her knees in the snow, Zubkova told CPJ. While holding her down, the man threatened to kill and sexually assault her children if she “opened her mouth again,” Zubkova said. After the attack, Zubkova fled Kiselyovsk to an undisclosed location...


Investigative journalist Visar Duriqi assaulted in Kosovo

Shortly after midnight on February 25, three unidentified masked men attacked Duriqi, an investigative reporter for the local news website Insajderi, outside his home in Fushë Kosova/Kosovo Polje, a municipality of Pristina, the capital... The men hit Duriqi and knocked him to the ground, where they kicked him in the head and broke two of his teeth...


CPJ joins call for Nicaraguan government to stop restricting press freedom

The Committee to Protect Journalists today joined three other human rights organizations in a joint statement commemorating Nicaragua’s national Day of the Journalist and calling on authorities to end the widespread harassment of members of the press, and ensure media outlets and press freedom organizations can work safely... Since officials and security forces responded brutally to widespread protests in April 2018, as CPJ documented at the time, news outlets have been forced to close and individual journalists have been threatened, harassed, sued, surveilled, jailed, and forced into exile... The statement also expresses concern about two pieces of legislation passed late last year, including one that requires individuals and organizations receiving funding from outside Nicaragua to register as “foreign agents,” and which expanded the government’s capacity to control and silence the press...


All from CPJ

42John5918
Bearbeitet: Mrz. 5, 2021, 12:07 am

At least 3 US reporters face court hearings on charges from 2020 coverage of protests and rallies

This month, three journalists who are facing charges are scheduled to appear in court in relation to their coverage of protests and rallies in 2020... “It is disheartening that prosecutors would continue to pursue charges against reporters who were merely doing their jobs and reporting on events of public interest in their communities”...

On May 31, 2020, police in Des Moines, Iowa, pepper-sprayed and arrested Sahouri while she was covering a protest against police brutality... Police arrested Cummings on June 1, while he was filming a police brutality protest... Authorities charged him with disorderly conduct, disturbing the peace, and failure to disperse during a riot... On October 21, police in Graham, North Carolina, arrested Murawski while he was covering a march encouraging voter turnout...


Brazilian journalist Patrícia Campos Mello sued President Bolsonaro’s son for moral damages – and won

In May of last year, Eduardo Bolsonaro, a Brazilian congressman and the son of President Jair Bolsonaro, made a series of searing accusations against journalist Patrícia Campos Mello on the YouTube channel of far-right media company Terça Livre. He claimed that Campos Mello, a reporter with Brazilian daily Folha de S.Paulo, had attempted to use sex to gain damning information about his father and tried to interfere with the 2018 presidential election... In response, Campos Mello sued the younger Bolsonaro for moral damages in a civil court – and won...


Both from CPJ

Turkish court refuses to admit US Khashoggi report as trial evidence (Guardian)

A Turkish court trying 26 Saudi nationals in absentia for the murder of Jamal Khashoggi has refused to admit as evidence a recent US intelligence report implicating the kingdom’s crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, despite a petition from the journalist’s fiancee, Hatice Cengiz... Cengiz’s petition to add the report to the evidence case file was rejected on the grounds that it would “bring nothing” to the trial...

43John5918
Mrz. 5, 2021, 11:56 am

Women ‘have finally started talking’: Three female journalists on covering sexual violence in Russia

Reporting on gender-based violence in Russia has become more challenging in recent years. In 2017 the government controversially decriminalized some forms of domestic violence, leading to a sharp drop in reported incidents, which journalists told CPJ does not reflect the true scope of the problem. And last year, Russia passed a new libel law to punish false accusers of sexual assault, leaving journalists and the women they interview wary of legal action for publishing such stories. Yet in spite of this, independent reporters have continued to pursue the beat. Outlets like Daptar, which covers gender issues in the Muslim-majority Russian republic of Dagestan, and Holod, an investigative web magazine in Moscow, give voice to women experiencing violence and harassment beyond the official figures...


Staff of Cuban press freedom group ICLEP lose internet service, fear targeted disruption

Since February 24, dozens of employees of ICLEP, a Cuban press freedom organization that also publishes seven free newspapers in the country, have been unable to connect to the internet on their mobile phones... At least 42 journalists and directors of ICLEP, located in seven different provinces, have lost all internet connectivity on their phones, and staff have also reported their home computers connecting to the internet unusually slowly...


Both from CPJ

44John5918
Mrz. 7, 2021, 11:13 pm

Monitoring media for women in Sudan (Radio Dabanga)

In 2019, Radio Dabanga began monitoring its media content and audiences, with a specific focus on representation of women in the audience and in the newsroom. Overall, the gender balance of both presenter and guest voices at Radio Dabanga has improved since gathering of gender-disaggregated data began...

45John5918
Bearbeitet: Mrz. 8, 2021, 11:11 pm

Mexican mayor attempts to drive journalist Albert Amaro off road

On March 2, at about 6:15 p.m., a sport utility vehicle attempted to force Amaro off the road while he was driving with his son in the municipality of Tetla de la Solidaridad, in Tlaxcala state, east of Mexico City, the journalist told CPJ in a phone interview. He said the car attempted to crash into his vehicle and “just barely missed me,” and that he identified its driver as Eleazar Molina Pérez, the mayor of that municipality...


Tajikistan RFE/RL correspondents assaulted while covering rising gas prices

On March 4, an unidentified security guard at a gas station in Dushanbe, the capital, assaulted Abdulloeva (known as Adbullo), a camera operator, and Yusufzoda (known as Yusufi), a reporter, both of whom work for the U.S. Congress-funded broadcaster Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty’s Tajik-language service, known locally as Radio Ozodi... The journalists were interviewing a driver about rising gas prices in the country when the security guard approached them and demanded they stop filming, and then shoved Abdulloeva and covered her camera with his hands, according to those reports and Yusufzoda. Yusufzoda intervened to stop the scuffle, and the guard punched him in the jaw...


Police in Kazakhstan attack, harass 2 journalists covering fire

In the early hours of March 2, in the southern city of Shymkent, police confronted Abdullaev, a correspondent for the broadcaster 31 Arna, and Talibzhanov, a correspondent for broadcaster Astana TV, while they filmed a fire at a storage facility...


All from CPJ

UK launches action plan to prevent harassment and abuse of journalists (Guardian)

The UK’s first national action plan aimed at protecting journalists from abuse and harassment has been published by the government with the backing of police and union leaders. Reporters have told of suffering abuse and attacks, such as being punched, threatened with knives, forcibly detained and subjected to rape and death threats, the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) said. Commitments in the action plan include training for police officers and journalists, while prosecution services across the UK have reaffirmed their commitment to taking a robust approach to crimes against reporters. Civil servants in DCMS and the Home Office are to launch a call for evidence to build a better understanding of threats and abuse against journalists in order to tackle the issue...


Sidhique Kappan: Jailed and 'tortured' for trying to report a rape (BBC)

a 19-year-old Dalit woman had died after she was allegedly gang-raped by four of her upper-caste neighbours in the village of Bhulgarhi in Hathras. The story of the brutal assault, the woman's death and a forced cremation in the middle of the night by the police without her family's consent had made headlines around the world...

Sidhique Kappan, a 41-year-old journalist for the Malayalam-language news portal Azhimukham, also set out for Bhulgarhi, travelling from Delhi where he had been based for nine years... Mr Kappan was arrested with three other men in a car about 42km (26 miles) short of Hathras. Last week, he completed his 150th day in jail... In the police lockup that night - according to an account he gave his family and lawyer - Mr Kappan was "dragged and beaten with sticks on thighs, slapped on face, forced to stay awake from 6pm to 6am on the pretext of questioning and subjected to serious mental torture". A diabetic, he was also denied his medication, he said. The police have denied his allegations. They say they arrested Mr Kappan because he was going to Hathras as part of a conspiracy to create law and order trouble and foment caste riots. The other three men in the car have been accused of similar offences...

46John5918
Mrz. 10, 2021, 7:03 am

Russian journalist Aleksey Mironov interrogated, charged over Navalny protest coverage (CPJ)

On March 5, police in Cheboksary, the capital of the central Russian autonomous republic of Chuvashia, detained Mironov, a freelance camera operator, at his home, and brought him to the city’s First Police Station for questioning, according to news reports and the journalist, who spoke to CPJ in a phone interview. Officers interrogated Mironov for about four hours about his alleged participation in a January 23 rally in support of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, he said. Mironov told CPJ that he covered that rally on assignment for the U.S. Congress-funded broadcaster Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL), as the broadcaster also reported. Police released Mironov after charging him with participating in an unauthorized protest, he said; if convicted, he could face up to 15 days in detention, according to Russia’s administrative code...


The British press isn't racist, say the editors. That just shows how long the problem will endure (Guardian)

The kneejerk denial of Meghan’s claims would not happen if the industry was open, honest and truly diverse...


New York Times journalist Nicole Perlroth on the secret trade in tools used to hack the press (CPJ)

The last time cybersecurity journalist Nicole Perlroth spoke with Emirati activist Ahmed Mansoor in 2016, his passport had been taken and he had recently been beaten almost to the point of death. “We learned later on that our phone conversation had been tapped, that someone was in his baby monitor, that his wife was being spied on,” Perlroth told CPJ in a phone conversation in early March. “He was really living in a prison”...


China summons UK ambassador over 'arrogant' article on media freedom (Guardian)

Britain’s ambassador to China has been summoned for a dressing down by the authorities in Beijing over an “inappropriate” article she wrote defending recent international media coverage on the country, the foreign ministry said... Wilson sought to explain why foreign media criticism of the Chinese government did not mean the journalists responsible did not like China, but were in fact acting in “good faith” and playing an active role in monitoring government action...


Nicaraguan journalist Wilih Narváez and family repeatedly harassed, threatened (CPJ)

On February 24, an unidentified man went to Narváez’s house in Managua, the capital, and yelled at the journalist’s mother and told her he knew that it was the home of a journalist from Canal 10, the broadcaster where until recently Narváez had worked as a reporter and host, according to the journalist... “He even made signs with his hands that he was going to cut off my head,” Narváez told the Nicaraguan news website Confidencial. On February 28, the same man returned to Narváez’s house, told the journalist he would kill him, and threw rocks that landed on the roof but did not damage Narváez’s home, the journalist told CPJ and the local newspaper La Prensa. Narváez told CPJ that he notified the Nicaraguan National Police of the incident on February 28, but said authorities have taken no action...


Peruvian congressional candidate files criminal defamation suit against 2 journalists over coverage of sexual harassment allegations (CPJ)

On February 25, Victor Hugo Quijada, a Peruvian congressional candidate, filed a criminal defamation lawsuit against Tiburcio, a reporter at the news website Wayka, and Távara, an editor at the outlet, after the website published a story earlier that day alleging he had sexually harassed minors, according to a report by Wayka and Távara, who spoke to CPJ via messaging app. In the lawsuit, which CPJ reviewed, Quijada alleges that Tiburcio, who wrote the story, Távara, and three of the alleged victims caused “irreparable damage to my honor and good name.” Quijada and the defendants will be called before a criminal court judge, where Quijada will argue for the judge to accept his suit, and the court will decide whether to dismiss the suit or allow it to proceed, Távara said. If convicted, the journalists could face up to three years in prison...


47John5918
Mrz. 10, 2021, 11:11 pm

Iowa journalist Andrea Sahouri acquitted on misdemeanor charges from 2020 protest coverage (CPJ)

Police pepper-sprayed and arrested Sahouri while she was covering a Black Lives Matter protest in Des Moines on May 31, 2020; the Polk County prosecutor subsequently charged her with failure to disperse and interference with official acts... About a dozen other journalists face ongoing legal action in the United States in relation to their reporting...

48John5918
Mrz. 11, 2021, 11:18 pm

Several stories from the Guardian today.

What is journalism for? The short answer: truth

Contrast the situation here in the UK, where there is a robust and for some choking regulatory framework with the US, where oversight in one crucial respect is nonexistent: the requirement to fairly represent the views of opposing sides in news and current affairs broadcasts. Could that lack of a check on how America does news actually imperil democracy itself?...


What Piers Morgan’s exit tells us about the future of impartial broadcasting in the UK

This is not about whether Morgan will end up working for Rupert Murdoch’s News UK streaming service or Andrew Neil’s GB News... but about whether it can possibly be right to publicly disown the truth of somebody else’s mental distress. The pretty obvious answer is that it cannot – and yet Morgan’s departure has still somehow managed to stir up a row over what impartiality means in broadcast news. It may be tempting to ignore this, but a failure to reassert the principles of impartiality will make it easier for broadcasters to succumb to the economic and political pressures pushing them towards the sort of partisan TV media that is common in the US...


Daphne Caruana Galizia: killer lays out murder plot in court

Vincent Muscat describes spying on the journalist and discussions about how she would be killed...


News Corp Australia papers labelled 'sexist' and 'toxic' by former staff photographer at media inquiry

A veteran News Corp Australia photographer has given devastating evidence to a parliamentary inquiry about the way the Murdoch newspapers treated female employees and directed photographers to only take pictures of conventionally attractive young women... Rogers said she had been consistently told not to take pictures of “pigs in lipstick” while the appearance of male subjects was never raised...

49John5918
Mrz. 17, 2021, 12:01 am

Exiled Azerbaijani blogger Mahammad Mirzali stabbed at least 16 times in knife attack in France (CPJ)

On March 14, Mirzali, who runs the Made in Azerbaijan YouTube video blog, was walking in downtown Nantes, the city in western France where he lives in exile, when six men approached him and started punching him and stabbing him with knives in his arms, hands, legs, neck, and face, according to news reports in Caucasus and Azerbaijan-focused outlets. The reports also said that the attackers attempted to cut out his tongue...

50John5918
Mrz. 17, 2021, 11:36 pm

Belarusian authorities detain reporter Dzianis Ivashyn; prosecute journalists for protest coverage (CPJ)

On March 12, officers of the KGB, the Belarusian security service, in the western city of Hrodna detained Dzianis Ivashyn, an investigative reporter at the Novy Chas newspaper, and searched his apartment, according to a report by the Belarusian Association of Journalists, a local advocacy and trade group, and news reports. Authorities charged him with “interference with the activities of a law-enforcement officer,” according to another report by the association.

Volha Ivashyna, Dzianis’s wife, told the journalist’s association that officers confiscated phones, laptops, books, and business cards during the raid, and sought out anything in the Ukrainian language or related to Ukraine. In early March, Ivashyn published an article alleging that former officers of the Ukrainian riot police unit Berkut, which was disbanded over brutality allegations in 2014, had been hired by the Belarusian police, and named some of those officers...

51John5918
Bearbeitet: Mrz. 19, 2021, 12:01 am

Cuban police raid newspaper Páginas Villareñas, confiscate equipment and harass staff (CPJ)

In the evening of March 14, agents from the National Revolutionary Police and the Political Police detained reporters Yoandy Cuellar and Yunier Pérez at the outlet’s office in the central province of Santa Clara... ICLEP is a local press freedom organization that prints and distributes free newspapers throughout the country, including Páginas Villareñas, according to its website. Officers took both journalists to the Fifth Unit local police station, where they interrogated them about their work, including how much they were paid, according to that statement and Hernández. Police then raided the paper’s office and confiscated two printers, two laptops, four cell phones, a tablet, four USB sticks, and paper and ink, according to another statement by ICLEP. With its equipment confiscated, Páginas Villareñas was forced to shut down on March 16...


Rees-Mogg under fire after calling journalist 'either a knave or a fool' (Guardian)

Jacob Rees-Mogg is facing criticism after he accused a journalist of being “either a knave or a fool” over a story about the foreign secretary, Dominic Raab, the second time in recent weeks ministers have targeted individual reporters with claims of distorted coverage.

The National Union of Journalists (NUJ) said Rees-Mogg was among ministers of “acting like playground bullies”, while Labour accused the government of routinely undermining journalists. HuffPost UK, the outlet targeted by Rees-Mogg, responded by accusing the leader of the Commons of using the legal privilege of speaking in parliament “to smear a journalist”, and demanded he produce evidence for the allegation or retract it...


52John5918
Mrz. 19, 2021, 12:04 pm

RFE/RL contributor Vladislav Yesypenko arrested, accused of espionage in Crimea (CPJ)

On March 10, Federal Security Service officers in Russian-occupied Crimea detained Yesypenko, a freelance journalist, according to news reports and a lawyer hired by his family, Emil Kurbedinov, who spoke with CPJ in a phone interview but who has been prevented from meeting his client. Yesypenko frequently contributes to Krym.Realii, a Crimea-focused outlet run by the Ukrainian-language service of the U.S. Congress-funded broadcaster Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, according to a report by RFE/RL. On March 12, the Kyiv District Court of Simferopol, the Crimean capital, charged Yesypenko with “illegal production, repair, or modifying of firearms,” and ordered him to be held for two months awaiting trial, according to a joint statement issued by several Ukraine-focused human rights organizations, and those news reports. On March 16, the Federal Security Service published a statement accusing Yesypenko of espionage on behalf of Ukraine...

53John5918
Mrz. 20, 2021, 12:12 am

Myanmar protests: BBC journalist Aung Thura detained (BBC)

A reporter with the BBC Burmese service has been detained in Myanmar as clashes continue between security forces and protesters. Aung Thura was taken away by men in plain clothes while reporting outside a court in the capital, Nay Pyi Taw. The BBC said in a statement that it was extremely concerned and called on the authorities to help locate him...

54John5918
Mrz. 21, 2021, 9:37 am

High-risk news coverage: Reporting the crackdown in Myanmar (Al Jazeera)

Myanmar’s military leaders are deploying forces, both armed and digital, to stifle news coverage. Plus, partisan punditry on Britain’s airwaves. As military leaders ban independent media and arrest reporters, citizen journalists become an information lifeline in Myanmar...

55John5918
Mrz. 22, 2021, 12:31 am

A racist, belligerent press doesn’t just hurt its targets, it’s bad for all of us (Guardian)

Whether it’s EU migrants or Black Lives Matter campaigners, enemies are singled out to keep Britain’s hierarchies intact...

The myth is right in some sense: journalism is a crusading craft. But its battles are so often waged against vulnerable people, the dispossessed and those seeking to reform society. Because, increasingly, the role of the media in this country is to work out what the rough lines of the social, racial and economic hierarchy are, and sell to its consumers the fear that this is under threat. This doesn’t mean that there are no good journalists doing important and impactful work, but they exist in an ecosystem that doesn’t discriminate between those who actually have power and those who don’t...

56John5918
Bearbeitet: Mrz. 23, 2021, 12:51 pm

Afghanistan: The women killed for working at a TV station

Women make up a large number of those killed in a deadly campaign of targeted attacks on civil society in Afghanistan by extremist groups opposed to them working outside the home. One television station in the eastern city of Jalalabad has been forced to send all its female staff home for their own safety, after four young female employees were killed in recent months...


Polish writer Jakub Zulczyk charged for calling President Duda a 'moron'

A popular Polish writer and journalist could face up to three years in prison for calling President Andrzej Duda a "moron" in a Facebook post in November...


Both from BBC

Peruvian presidential candidate files trademark complaint against journalist and Penguin Random House

On March 11, Acuña, a former mayor, governor, and congressman who is running for president in Peru’s April 11 election, filed a trademark infringement complaint to stop sales of Acosta’s book, Money Like Popcorn: Secrets, Impunity, and the Fortune of César Acuña... Acosta told CPJ that he published the book in February, and that it contains allegations that Acuña engaged in vote-buying, misappropriation of public funds, and plagiarism...

In his complaint, filed with Peru’s National Institute to Defend Competition and Intellectual Property (INDECOPI), Acuña claims that he invented the phrase “money like popcorn” (“plata como cancha”) and trademarked it, and that the book thereby constitutes an infringement on that copyright and the book’s sales and publication should be barred...


Mexican journalist Jorge Molontzín missing in Sonora since March 10

Molontzín, a reporter with the magazine Confidencial, went missing on March 10 while he was driving near the municipality of Santa Ana, in the northern state of Sonora, according to a statement published by Confidencial on March 17. Confidencial editor José Alfredo Gaston Gastelum told CPJ in a phone interview that he last spoke with Molontzín in the morning of March 10, when the reporter told him that he was driving a red Nissan SUV from the town of Benjamín Hill to Santa Ana. The journalist was accompanied by a friend, horticulturalist Eudocio Cruz, whose whereabouts are also unknown, he said. Lazaro Molontzín, a lawyer and the reporter’s nephew, told CPJ in a phone interview that Molontzín checked in with his family at about 2 p.m. on the day he went missing, and has not been heard from since...


Both from CPJ

Top Saudi official issued death threat against UN's Khashoggi investigator (Guardian)

A senior Saudi official issued what was perceived to be a death threat against the independent United Nations investigator, Agnès Callamard, after her investigation into the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi. In an interview with the Guardian, the outgoing special rapporteur for extrajudicial killings said that a UN colleague alerted her in January 2020 that a senior Saudi official had twice threatened in a meeting with other senior UN officials in Geneva that month to have Callamard “taken care of” if she was not reined in by the UN. Asked how the comment was perceived by her Geneva-based colleagues, Callamard said: “A death threat. That was how it was understood”...


57John5918
Bearbeitet: Mrz. 24, 2021, 12:13 am

Several from CPJ today

Kazakhstan adopts new accreditation requirements that journalists fear will promote censorship

On March 11, the Ministry of Information and Social Development adopted amendments to the 2013 Rules of Accreditation of Journalists, which include a requirement for journalists to work with a loosely defined “host” when covering government events, according to news reports and Tamara Kaleyeva, head of the Kazakh press freedom group Adil Soz, who spoke with CPJ in a phone interview. According to Kaleyeva, the regulations do not define how the “host” would be selected; she said that the state organizations organizing such events would most likely be in charge of appointing the host, and that person would therefore be a “guard, a censor”...


Kyrgyz journalists on the online ‘fake farms’ that threaten to kill them

“At first, they appeared on my Instagram, then they showed up on my Facebook and YouTube accounts,” Ali Toktakunov told CPJ in a phone interview. The investigative Kyrgyz journalist and founder of Ali Toktakunov’s Media Hub, a foundation for investigative journalism, says he is a frequent target of trolls or fake social media accounts that journalists have identified as conducting apparently orchestrated attacks on members of the press...


Brazilian journalist’s home, newspaper office targeted in arson attack

At 4:19 a.m. on March 17, in the city of Olímpia, in the southeastern state of São Paulo, an unidentified attacker set fire to a building that houses both the headquarters of Folha da Região and Arantes’ home, according to news reports and the journalist, who spoke to CPJ in a phone interview. Video footage from a neighbor’s security camera shows a man arriving on a motorcycle, pouring a liquid onto the separate entrances of the newspaper and Arantes’ home, and setting them on fire. The journalist and his family were able to escape the flames without severe injuries, he said...


CPJ calls on US government to give journalists access to border detention facilities

The United States Department of Homeland Security must allow journalists access to detention facilities and Border Patrol activities along the U.S.- Mexico border, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today. In recent weeks, D.H.S. and Border Patrol officials have barred all members of the press from entering detention facilities, according to an account from Getty Images photographer John Moore in The Washington Post and other news reports. Moore also wrote in the Post article that Border Patrol officials would not allow him to photograph agents detaining migrants. Officials have cited COVID-19 and privacy concerns for the restrictions, according to those reports...


Plus CNN on that last story: Biden administration continues to deny journalists access to border facilities

The Biden administration has so far denied journalists access to border facilities amid a surge of unaccompanied minors crossing the US-Mexico border, which has raised questions about its commitments to increased transparency. Senators from both sides of the aisle have called on the administration to allow journalists access to the facilities...


The Guardian: Vilifying journalists is just part of the UK government's modus operandi

Jacob Rees-Mogg’s recent attack on a HuffPost journalist for merely doing his job is part of a worrying, bullying trend...

58John5918
Bearbeitet: Mrz. 26, 2021, 3:36 am

Journalists released in Myanmar, Morocco, and Somalia

In some much-welcomed good news, at least three journalists were released from prison this week: AP journalist Thein Zaw in Myanmar; Kilwe Adan Farah in Puntland, Somalia; and Maati Monjib in Morocco...


Argentine newspaper office ransacked, journalist threatened following reporting on sexual assault

Yesterday at about noon, a group of approximately 100 people entered Río Negro’s offices in the city of General Roca, Río Negro province, ransacked the premises, assaulted several workers, and made death threats to Leiva, according to news reports and Italo Pisani, the newspaper’s editor-in-chief, who spoke to CPJ via messaging app. Many of the attackers are clearly identifiable in video of the attack, and many wore vests identifying themselves as members of the Argentine Workers’ Central Union (CTA Autónoma), a national trade union. The attack took place minutes after a Rio Negro judge filed sexual harassment and assault charges against Miguel Báez, leader of the Organization of the Unemployed in Struggle (ODEL), a branch of CTA Autónoma, according to those reports, which stated that the attackers were members of the ODEL...


CPJ joins call to reject draft EU regulation for online terrorist content

The Committee to Protect Journalists joined dozens of civil society organizations today in urging the European Parliament to reject a draft regulation on terrorist content online when it is proposed for a vote in April. The letter, which was sent to every member of parliament, notes that the draft would allow national authorities to order internet companies to remove online content within one hour without judicial oversight, even if the content is hosted in another EU state. It also reiterates concerns that platforms may resort to automated tools in order to comply – such as upload filters that prevent information from being published. CPJ has been advocating for improvements to the text on the grounds that it threatens journalistic content and the source material that journalists rely on to report the news...


All from CPJ

And from Voice of America: South Sudan Government Threatens Rights Activists Living Abroad

A new report says South Sudanese journalists, rights activists and opposition members living outside the country are still at risk of being harassed and even killed by South Sudanese authorities, most notably by the National Security Service (NSS) intelligence agency...

59John5918
Bearbeitet: Mrz. 27, 2021, 7:53 am

Russian journalist Mariya Nuykina repeatedly jailed over protest coverage (CPJ)

On March 19, police in the eastern city of Khabarovsk detained Nuykina, a correspondent with the independent newspaper Arsenyevskiye Vesti, while she was covering protesters detained at the local branch of the Investigative Committee, according to media reports and a statement by the Professional Union of Journalists and Media Workers, an independent press freedom advocacy group of which Nuykina is a member.

The following day, a court convicted her of “failure to comply with police orders” stemming from her coverage of protests in support of the region’s former governor on December 26, 2020, and sentenced Nuykina to three days in jail, according to the same reports. She was released on March 22 after serving the full sentence, according to reports.

Nuykina told CPJ in a phone interview that this was the second time she had been jailed for covering the same protest. Authorities previously detained her on January 29, held her overnight, and the following day convicted her of “disturbing traffic” during that December 26 protest and sentenced her to one day in prison, she said.

Nuykina was technically released on January 30, but authorities immediately detained her yet again, then for allegedly illegally participating in a September 19, 2020, protest, she told CPJ. She was held overnight, and on February 1 a court fined her 10,000 rubles (US $131) for that offense, she said...

60John5918
Mrz. 28, 2021, 12:54 am

Police under fire for 'assault' of journalist at Bristol protest (Guardian)

Police have come under fire for their treatment of a reporter at demonstrations in Bristol on Friday night, during violent clashes between officers and protesters, amid wider demands for an investigation into the handling of the protests. Daily Mirror journalist Matthew Dresch shared video footage that appeared to show police pushing him and hitting him with a baton as he shouted that he was a member of the press...

61John5918
Mrz. 29, 2021, 12:09 am

Bolsonaro: Brazil's president ordered to pay damages to journalist (BBC)

A Brazilian court has ordered President Jair Bolsonaro to pay compensation to a journalist after he made degrading comments about her. Mr Bolsonaro had suggested last year that Patrícia Campos Mello had offered sex to a source for negative information about him. The judge said Mr Bolsonaro's remarks had damaged the journalist's honour...

62aspirit
Mrz. 29, 2021, 5:57 pm

>60 John5918: and >61 John5918: At least not all the news is heartbreaking.

63John5918
Mrz. 30, 2021, 12:23 am

Russian journalist Vasiliy Vaysenberg threatened over report on electoral official’s salary (CPJ)

On March 25, an unidentified person called Vaysenberg’s wife, Alisa, and threatened the couple’s son, saying, “I don’t want {your son} Misha to fall off the scooter next time. Do you understand me?”... Vaysenberg, an independent journalist who writes for several outlets, said he was worried that his family had been surveilled, as the caller knew that his wife took their son to kindergarten on a scooter that day. Vaysenberg said that the caller demanded he take down and publicly apologize for a March 18 article that was published on the website of Golos, an independent election monitoring organization of which Vaysenberg is a member. It alleges that Andrey Gibert, the head of electoral commission of the northern Yamal–Nenets autonomous district, received a salary several times higher than salaries of other regional officials, including the region’s governor...

64John5918
Bearbeitet: Mrz. 31, 2021, 1:09 pm

Family of slain Turkish journalist Hrant Dink vows to appeal trial verdict (CPJ)

On March 26, the 14th Istanbul Court of Serious Crimes acquitted 37 of 77 defendants on trial for the journalist’s 2007 killing, and convicted 26, according to local independent outlet Bianet. Of those convicted, four were sentenced to life in prison, including two without the possibility of parole, according to that report. Among those convicted was Ercan Gün, a former news editor for FOX TV Turkey, who has been imprisoned since 2016 for allegedly conspiring to blame the Turkish government for the journalist’s killing; he was sentenced to 10 years in prison for “being a member of an armed terrorist organization,” according to independent online newspaper Diken, which said that he pleaded not guilty. Dink’s family intends to appeal the verdict, saying in a statement that they did not believe that the court exposed the full conspiracy behind his killing...


Journalists allowed inside facility for migrant children at US-Mexico border (Guardian)

The Biden administration for the first time on Tuesday allowed a limited pool of journalists inside its main detention facility for migrant children at the US-Mexico border. The visit revealed a severely overcrowded tent structure where more than 4,000 migrants, including children and families, packed into pods and the youngest kept in a large playpen with mats on the floor for sleeping... The facility has a capacity of 250 but more than 4,100 people were being housed on the property Tuesday. Most were unaccompanied children...


Chilean National Television reporter and camera operator shot and wounded (CPJ)

On March 27 at about 9 p.m., unidentified attackers shot at Núñez, a reporter, and Sánchez, a camera operator with the state media outlet, injuring Núñez in his forearm and Sánchez in the eye and chest... Sánchez lost an eye and remains hospitalized, but his injuries are not life-threatening, according to news reports and Ahumada. Núñez received a minor injury to his forearm, according to those reports...


Belarus police detain and fine at least 16 journalists over protest coverage, ties to foreign news outlets (CPJ)

Between March 18 and 27, Belarusian authorities detained at least 16 journalists and fined at least three members of the press... Of those journalists, only Poczobut, a political commentator and producer of Nad Niemnem, a TV program that covers issues affecting the ethnic Polish minority in Belarus for Polish public broadcaster TVP Polonia, remains in detention as of today... All of the detained journalists had recently covered protests in their respective cities calling for the resignation of the Belarusian President Aleksandr Lukashenko...


Montenegro court rejects journalist Jovo Martinović’s appeal (CPJ)

On March 28, the Court of Appeals in the capital, Podgorica, rejected Martinović’s appeal and upheld his one-year prison sentence on drug trafficking charges... “Montenegro seems determined to continue denying journalist Jovo Martinović the justice he deserves in his fight to clear his name of retaliatory drug charges”...


65John5918
Bearbeitet: Apr. 1, 2021, 12:11 am

Kazakh journalist Aigul Utepova tried over political coverage (CPJ)

On March 15, the Saryakinsky District Court in Nur-Sultan, the capital, commenced Utepova’s trial on charges of participating in banned political movements, which the journalist’s lawyer, Galym Nurpeisov, says are retaliation for her political coverage...

66John5918
Apr. 1, 2021, 7:55 am

‘Collateral Crucifixion’: Enormous mural tribute to Julian Assange unveiled on Berlin building (RT)



Pope Francis writes to Julian Assange (Rome Reports)

Julian Assange, founder of WikiLeaks, received a personal message from Pope Francis...

67John5918
Bearbeitet: Apr. 2, 2021, 11:23 am

Serbian outlet KRIK faces smear campaign after journalist questions president (CPJ)

On March 7, during a press conference, a KRIK reporter asked Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić about the government’s alleged connections with organized crime groups; Vučić did not answer, and instead dismissed the reporter and called her rude for asking such a question, KRIK reported. In the days following that press conference, ruling party politicians and pro-government media outlets accused KRIK of being tied to organized crime; KRIK project manager Jelena Vasić told CPJ in an email that the outlet is “strongly denying these allegations and considers these attacks as a smear campaign by pro-governmental media to discredit KRIK’s journalistic investigations.” KRIK and its staffers also received death threats in comments on the outlet’s Facebook page, including calls to shoot the outlet’s journalists, according to screenshots of such comments Vasić sent to CPJ...


Family of photographer urge Libya to investigate his death (Guardian)

The family of a British-based photographer killed in 2011 by pro-Gaddafi forces during the Arab spring have launched a campaign to pressure Libya to investigate his death. Anton Hammerl, 41, was shot after being targeted as part of a small group of journalists, including the US reporter James Foley who himself was subsequently kidnapped and murdered by Islamic State in Syria. Left for dead in the desert after Foley and fellow journalists Clare Morgana Gillis and Manu Brabo were captured, Hammerl’s body has never been recovered...


Venezuelan authorities detain NTN24 reporting team covering conflict near Colombia border (CPJ)

At about 12:30 p.m. yesterday, Venezuelan National Guard officers detained Pérez, a reporter, and Hernández, a camera operator, while they were on assignment for the privately owned Colombian cable television outlet NTN24 covering an ongoing military conflict in the area of La Victoria, in the state of Apure, which borders Colombia... The officers also arrested Juan Salazar and Diógenes Tirado, two local activists from the non-governmental organization Fundaredes, who were assisting the NTN24 team in their reporting...


China 'driving out journalists', EU says after BBC's Sudworth leaves (BBC)

The EU has accused China of harassing foreign correspondents after the BBC's Beijing correspondent John Sudworth was forced to move to Taiwan. Foreign correspondents were "being driven out of China as a result of continuous harassment and obstruction to their work", it said. It urged China to abide by its international legal obligations to ensure freedom of speech and press. Sudworth left following pressure and threats from the Chinese authorities...


68davidgn
Bearbeitet: Apr. 2, 2021, 8:15 pm

A new chapter in the UK's ongoing pattern of attacking "inconvenient" journalists.

https://consortiumnews.com/2021/03/30/letter-from-london-a-troubling-decision/

Alexander Mercouris says the conviction of former British diplomat Craig Murray undermines the right of the media to report cases, which is vital to protect the right to a fair trial.

...The case against Murray has resulted in a judgment convicting him of contempt of court. He is now at serious risk of up to two years in prison with sentencing set for May 7.
...
The Court acknowledged that there is no evidence that anyone did in fact identify any of the witnesses as a result of anything which Murray wrote. It also said that Murray’s intentions were irrelevant. Even if Murray had had no intention of writing anything which might have led to the identification of any one of the witnesses, and even if there were no evidence that anything he wrote did in fact result in anyone identifying any one of the witnesses, Murray would still be guilty of contempt of court if he failed what the Court called an “objective test” which decides whether something written might notionally identify a witness.

It is upon this reasoning that Murray has been convicted.

That may be a correct summary of the current law. However it seems that it sets the bar for court reporting extraordinarily high. I wonder whether the test is indeed as the Court supposes it to be, and if it is, whether the Court has applied it properly.

In my previous letter I wrote of my concern that a conviction in Murray’s case would undermine the right of the media to report cases, which is important in order to protect the right of accused persons to a fair trial, as enshrined in Article 6(1) of the European Convention on Human Rights.

It seems that with this ruling that is exactly the danger which the media are now facing.


----
cf. https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2021/04/contempt-of-court/

Contempt of Court
I am still frankly stunned that I was found in contempt of court. I maintain that I carefully identified nobody and, as empirically proven, the MSM did far more than I in revealing identities. I also believe that the terms of the Opinion would make it simply impossible to report anything except the prosecution case in any sexual assault trial – and that MSM journalists are entirely sanguine about this because they believe that in practice the ruling would only be used against dissidents, and never against them.

It is very difficult for me to try to explain why, in my own case, what has happened has much wider bad consequences, because it simply looks like special pleading. I am therefore very pleased that legal analyst Alexander Mercouris has written this important piece at Consortium News, and I should be grateful to you for reading it.

69John5918
Apr. 6, 2021, 11:39 am

Bolivian radio journalist Franklin Guzmán Zambrana assaulted, robbed while covering protest (CPJ)

On March 30, near the village of Santa Bárbara, about five miles northeast of the capital, La Paz, a group of truck drivers abducted, assaulted, and robbed Guzmán, a freelance reporter on assignment for the privately owned broadcaster Radio FM Bolivia... At the time of the attack, Guzmán was covering a demonstration by thousands of coca farmers who had blocked a highway near La Paz to protest the government’s decision to relocate a state-run collection site for their coca leaves... Truck drivers angry about the blockade confronted Guzmán and accused him of being a spy for the farmers; they then tied him up, struck him in the back with their fists, kicked him in the buttocks, stole his three cell phones, and then released him after about 90 minutes...

70John5918
Bearbeitet: Apr. 7, 2021, 11:26 am

'Brilliant and versatile' Observer and Guardian journalist Sarah Hughes dies at 48 (Guardian)

Hughes’ work ranged from hard-hitting overseas reports, to sport and television writing as well as candid accounts of coping with cancer...


At least 3 journalists briefly detained while covering imprisonment of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny (CPJ)

Authorities briefly detained CNN correspondent Mathew Chance as well as Ivan Slobodenyuk, a correspondent for Vot Tak TV, the Russian-language service of the Poland-based broadcaster Belsat TV, and Dmitry Nizovtsev, a correspondent with the YouTube channel of Navalny’s organization “Shtab Navalnogo”...


Peruvian journalist Carlos Alberto Tafur receives death threat after reporting on local corruption (CPJ)

On March 29, an unidentified man sent a voice message to Tafur, host of the daily “Señal Informativa Digital” news and opinion program on the privately owned broadcaster Radio Estereo G 96.5, and threatened him with death... In the recording, which CPJ reviewed, a man’s voice says, “If you continue raising hell on the radio you will see your head hanging from the radio station… You will also see your family hanging from the radio station. Keep it up and you will see”...

71John5918
Bearbeitet: Apr. 9, 2021, 1:28 pm

Brazilian journalist Diego Santos receives envelope with threat and bullets

On the morning of April 1, Santos checked the mailbox outside his home in the city of Boa Vista, the capital of the northern state of Roraima, and found an envelope with two bullets inside and a handwritten threat...


Russian RFE/RL journalist Daria Komarova faces 3 trials over protest coverage

Yesterday, the Leninsky district court in Cheboksary, the capital of the central Russian republic of Chuvashia, held the first hearing in the trial of Komarova, a freelance correspondent for the U.S. Congress-funded broadcaster Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty’s (RFE/RL) regional outlet Idel.Realii, in relation to her coverage of protests...


open letter calling on Brazilian Congressional leaders to protect press freedom

The letter, published today to coincide with Brazil’s National Day of the Journalist, describes an increasingly hostile environment for the Brazilian press. Members of the media, it says, face “difficulty in accessing public data, judicial censorship, content removal, threats and physical attacks, smear campaigns and online harassment.” It also notes the continued high rates of impunity for crimes against journalists in Brazil and says that “despite its international commitments and guarantees established in the Federal Constitution of 1988, Brazil has failed to protect press freedom and is at risk of setbacks.”

The document includes seven recommended actions that Brazil’s Congress should take to better protect journalists and ensure greater transparency and access to information, and calls on Pacheco and Lira to ensure that future legislation in both houses of Congress does not restrict press freedom or the work of journalists...


Colombian Supreme Court confirms defamation conviction of journalist Vicky Dávila, RCN

In its March 24 decision, the Supreme Court upheld an appellate court ruling from October 15, 2020, which Dávila had contested. In that October ruling, the court ordered Dávila and RCN to pay more than $43,000 in damages to the family of a police colonel who was removed from his post after Dávila reported on allegations that he was corrupt...


Veteran crime reporter Giorgos Karaivaz shot and killed in Greece

This afternoon, two unidentified men on a motorcycle approached Karaivaz while he was returning to his home in the Athens suburb of Alimos, and the motorcycle’s passenger shot him several times, killing him at the scene... Authorities have opened an investigation into the attack and its motivations; a police official said that the killing appeared to be “a professional hit”... Karaivaz worked for the private broadcaster Star TV and previously contributed to other Greek outlets and broadcasters, where he was well-known for his coverage of crime and police stories...


All from CPJ

72John5918
Apr. 10, 2021, 12:11 am

Greek crime journalist shot dead in Athens in ‘execution-style’ murder (Guardian)

A prominent Greek crime journalist has been shot dead in what was described as an “execution-style” murder near his home in Athens. Giorgos Karaivaz, who sought to illuminate Greece’s seamier underside with his coverage of law and order stories on the private Star TV channel, died of gunshot wounds outside his home in the south of the city. According to media reports, two men on a motorbike drew up beside him and the passenger opened fire at the journalist as he drove back from work. Twelve bullet casings were found at the scene and police said Karaivaz was hit at least six times with shots from a 9mm pistol. The weapon was probably muffled with a silencer. Aristotelia Peloni, a spokesperson for the centre-right government, said the murder had “shocked us all”...

73John5918
Apr. 11, 2021, 12:26 am

Russian police raid home of prominent journalist Roman Anin (Guardian)

Russian police have briefly detained and interrogated Roman Anin, one of the country’s leading investigative journalists, in a criminal probe suspected to be motivated by revenge for his investigations into the Kremlin elite. Investigators on Friday searched Anin’s Moscow apartment and seized telephones and other electronic equipment and documents... The case is linked to Anin’s 2016 investigation into a close ally of Vladimir Putin, whose wife, he wrote, appeared to be using a super-yacht estimated to cost more than $100m (£73m)...

74John5918
Apr. 12, 2021, 12:10 am

Britain is damaging its reputation by keeping Julian Assange in jail, says partner (Guardian)

Britain would be on stronger ground campaigning against authoritarian regimes if it pressed the Biden administration to drop its call to extradite Julian Assange on espionage charges, Stella Moris, Assange’s partner, has told the Guardian. Moris – who has two children with Assange – is trying to broaden the campaign of support for him by pointing to the global damage caused to the UK’s reputation by keeping him in jail for so long...

75John5918
Apr. 13, 2021, 12:00 am

Russian law enforcement raid apartment, interrogate journalist Roman Anin (CPJ)

On April 9, Federal Security Service (FSB) agents raided the Moscow apartment of Anin, chief editor and founder of the independent investigative news website iStories, and confiscated mobile phones, notebooks, and memory sticks from his home... After the search, which lasted about seven hours, officers took Anin to the headquarters of the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation for questioning; he refused to participate in an interrogation, and was released with a summons to return today... Today, Anin returned to the Investigative Committee headquarters and authorities interrogated him about an investigation he published in the independent newspaper Novaya Gazeta in 2016...

76John5918
Apr. 13, 2021, 2:19 am

An example of how a network like Al Jazeera provides coverage of areas which are often marginalised and under-reported by mainstream western media.

From the independent New Humanitarian, which provides detailed coverage of international humanitarian issues: Inside Story: How we broke the story of alleged COVID-19 corruption in South Sudan

With the start of 2021 – and the realisation that we wanted this story to be shared with a wide audience – we approached Al Jazeera, which has provided in-depth and specialised coverage of South Sudan since the country’s independence. The network has been committed to keeping South Sudan in the spotlight, covering events that have included renewed fighting, power struggles, its many acute humanitarian crises, and impunity for atrocities committed against civilians...

77John5918
Apr. 14, 2021, 12:01 am

Car used by Georgian broadcaster Formula TV vandalized

In the early hours of April 9, unknown perpetrators smashed all the windows of the car as it was parked near the home of the broadcaster’s driver, Archil Tibunashvili... at the time of the vandalization it was clearly marked with the Formula TV logo and a microphone with the same insignia was visible from the windows, said Gumbaridze. Gumbaridze told CPJ he believes that the vandalism was related to the broadcaster’s reporting, in particular its critical coverage of Georgian authorities...


Journalists detained, attacked while covering Kyrgyzstan referendum vote

On April 11, police officers detained at least four journalists covering voting in Kyrgyzstan’s local elections and a nationwide constitutional referendum, and election onlookers attacked at least one reporter...


Both from CPJ

78John5918
Bearbeitet: Apr. 16, 2021, 12:04 am

French journalist Nadiya Lazzouni receives letter with death threat, anti-Muslim slurs

On April 8, Lazzouni, a Paris-based video producer and founder of the news and commentary outlet Speak Up Channel, received an anonymous handwritten letter in the mail, photos of which CPJ reviewed, that contained death threats and sexist and anti-Muslim slurs...


Russian law enforcement raid student magazine DOXA, place 4 editors under home detention

Yesterday, law enforcement officers in Moscow raided the office of the independent student-run magazine DOXA and the apartments of the four editors, and arrested them... Officers took the journalists to the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation, where they were held for about two and a half hours and charged with “calling or otherwise involving minors into unlawful activities that might be dangerous”...


Palestinian journalist Muath Hamed questioned in Spain by alleged Israeli intelligence agent

In early February, officers with Spain’s Civil Guard called Hamed, a Palestinian reporter for the Qatari broadcaster Al-Araby TV and the news website Al-Araby al-Jadeed, and asked to speak with him about his asylum status, according to the journalist... However, when Hamed arrived at the Civil Guard headquarters in Madrid for that meeting on February 11, an officer put him in the custody of someone who told the journalist that he was an Israeli intelligence operative... The alleged intelligence agent questioned Hamed about the sources for his December 30, 2019, Al-Araby al-Jadeed story about shell companies and organizations allegedly used by the Israeli intelligence service Mossad to pay informants in Eastern Europe, Hamed told CPJ. He was then released unconditionally...


All from CPJ

79John5918
Apr. 17, 2021, 1:47 am

CPJ calls on local law enforcement in US to ensure journalist safety amid protests (CPJ)

The Committee to Protect Journalists today called on law enforcement in Brooklyn Center, Minnesota, and around the United States to ensure that journalists can freely and safely cover demonstrations against police violence. “We are deeply concerned by reports about law enforcement detaining members of the media covering protests in Brooklyn Center, and by authorities’ heavy-handed use of so-called less-lethal weapons,” said CPJ Program Director Carlos Martinez de la Serna, in New York. “Demonstrations against police violence are of immense public interest, and journalists should be able to cover them freely without concern that they will be attacked or arrested”...

80John5918
Bearbeitet: Apr. 20, 2021, 12:28 am

Chilean army allegedly monitored investigative journalists

CIPER’s report is related to the ongoing September 2019 investigation by the Chilean prosecutor’s office into whether the army broke the law by allegedly surveilling journalist Mauricio Weibel, now a CIPER contributor, as he was reporting on the army for a book in 2016, as CPJ documented. In 2019, the army referred CPJ to a statement denying any wrongdoing in the alleged surveillance of Weibel. According to CIPER’s report, in the course of the prosecutor’s office investigation, an officer from the Military Intelligence Directorate (DINE) admitted to requesting personal information on Weibel from the website of the Chilean civil registry; an IP address used for that query was also used to request information on five other reporters and their families...


Peruvian journalist Roberto Sánchez’s car firebombed

At about 5:40 a.m. on April 14, in the southern Peruvian city of Tacna, unidentified assailants on a motorcycle threw a homemade firebomb at Sánchez’s vehicle while it was parked outside the La Estación broadcaster, where Sánchez works as news director... Sánchez told CPJ that he believed the attack may have been connected to his recent political coverage, which had angered some people in Tacna...


Minnesota law enforcement must stop obstructing journalists covering protests

On the evening of April 16, law enforcement in Brooklyn Center corralled dozens of journalists along with people demonstrating against the police killing of Duante Wright, ordered them to lay face down on the grass, and released the reporters only after authorities reviewed their credentials and photographed their faces...Previously, on April 13, police arrested Adam Gray, a chief photojournalist for the U.K.-based South West News Service, while he was covering protests in the city...


All from CPJ. And from the BBC:

Handcuffed, blindfolded and beaten on Libya's front line

Ten years ago the Arab spring uprisings arrived in Libya, culminating in the long-time leader Colonel Muammar Gaddafi being deposed and killed. BBC News Arabic’s Special Correspondent Feras Kilani covered it from the beginning. During that time he has been kidnapped, shot at and almost bombed whilst trying to tell "one of the most complicated stories on Earth".


81John5918
Apr. 21, 2021, 2:21 am

Proposed Venezuelan foreign funding law could have ‘huge impact’ on independent outlets

a proposed foreign aid law that Venezuelan legislators are expected to approve in the coming months. In a nation with an authoritarian government that has already severely curtailed press freedoms... the legislation could squeeze or cut off one of the few sources of financing still available to independent news outlets in Venezuela...


Serbian radio host Daško Milinović assaulted, 1 suspect apprehended

On April 16, at about 6:45 a.m., two unidentified men pepper-sprayed Milinović while he was walking to work in the northern city of Novi Sad, and proceeded to knock him to the ground and beat him with metal rods...


Venezuelan Supreme Tribunal orders El Nacional daily to pay $13 million in defamation case

On April 16, the Civil Cassation Chamber of the Supreme Tribunal ordered El Nacional to pay 237,000 petros—a cryptocurrency run by the Venezuelan government—equivalent to about US$13.3 million, to Diosdado Cabello, a congressman and the vice president of the ruling Socialist Party... The ruling stemmed from a civil defamation suit Cabello filed against the newspaper over El Nacional’s republication of a January 2015 story from the Madrid-based newspaper ABC, which alleged he was connected to a drug-trafficking ring... El Nacional president and editor Miguel Henrique Otero told Colombian broadcaster NTN24 that the ruling will allow the Venezuelan government to seize El Nacional’s building, printing press, and other property...


All from CPJ

82John5918
Apr. 22, 2021, 2:45 am

Crimean court fines chief editor of Qirim newspaper (CPJ)

Yesterday, the magistrates’ court of the Zheleznodorozhny district of Simferopol, the capital of Russian-occupied Crimea, convicted Mamutov, chief editor of the independent newspaper Qirim, of “dissemination of information about a banned organization” without labeling it as such...

83proximity1
Apr. 22, 2021, 11:41 am


The New York Times Has Just Been Caught In Two Monstrous Lies | By I & I Editorial Board | April 21, 2021 | 22,676 views | 8 comments

___________

("About Issues & Insights:

Issues & Insights is run by the seasoned journalists behind the legendary IBD* Editorials page.")


* Investor's Business Daily (IBD)

84John5918
Bearbeitet: Apr. 22, 2021, 2:26 pm

Journalist Jeremy McDermott faces new criminal defamation suit in Colombia (CPJ)

On April 6, the national attorney general’s office notified McDermott, a British national and the co-director and legal representative of the Medellín-based news organization InSight Crime, that Guillermo Acevedo, the subject of an InSight Crime investigation, had filed a criminal defamation suit against him...


Nicaraguan police assault journalist Kalúa Salazar, block her from leaving home (PJ)

On April 19, at about 4:30 a.m., a riot police officer standing outside Salazar’s house in the Caribbean city of Bluefields grabbed her by the neck and attempted to take her phone, and a group of officers blocked her from leaving... “I complained to them. I took out my cell phone and started recording and, as I was recording, one of the riot police grabs me from behind. He grabbed me around the neck and shoulders, and he was trying to take my cell phone from me”... Police have maintained a regular presence outside Salazar’s home since early 2021, according to news reports, human rights organizations, and the journalist. She told CPJ that she believes the harassment is tied to authorities’ apprehensions over the country’s presidential elections in November and desire to silence the work of La Costeñisima, one of the few independent media outlet’s on Nicaragua’s Caribbean coast...

85John5918
Apr. 23, 2021, 3:00 pm

Hong Kong court convicts journalist who investigated metro attack (Guardian)

An award-winning Hong Kong news producer has been found guilty of criminal conduct after she accessed a public database while investigating an attack at a city metro station in 2019...


And three from CPJ:

Argentine court charges journalist Daniel Santoro with attempted extortion

On April 19, Judge Luis Rodríguez from the Ninth Federal Criminal and Correctional Court charged Santoro, an investigative journalist at national daily Clarín, with attempted extortion...


Uzbek journalist Sid Yanyshev charged over corruption reporting

Yesterday afternoon, police in Tashkent, the capital, arrested Yanyshev, who works as a freelance contributor to the independent news website Fergana, according to a report by Fergana and the journalist, who spoke to CPJ in a video interview. Yanyshev told CPJ that he immediately demanded the presence of lawyer, but said that police denied that request and attempted to pressure him into signing a form giving up his right to representation, which he refused to sign. After about three hours in police custody, officers brought Yanyshev to the Yakkasaroy District Court, where he was charged with distributing “false information” over a Facebook post in which he described corruption allegations against a local construction company...


At least 10 journalists detained while covering pro-Navalny rallies in Russia

Yesterday, police detained at least 10 journalists and harassed several others in relation to their coverage of unauthorized protests in support of jailed Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, which took place in dozens of cities throughout the country...

86John5918
Apr. 27, 2021, 12:07 am

Russia designates independent outlets Meduza and PASMI as ‘foreign agents’ (CPJ)

On April 23, Russia’s Justice Ministry added the independent Latvia-based news website Meduza to its list of “foreign agents,” thereby imposing new legal requirements on the outlet for it to continue operating in Russia... On the same day, the ministry also added PASMI, a Russia-based news outlet that covers alleged corruption, to that list, according to those reports. The outlet’s CEO and acting chief editor Dmitry Verbitsky told local outlet MBKh Media that PASMI did not receive any foreign funding and speculated that its addition to the list was “a mistake”...

87John5918
Bearbeitet: Apr. 27, 2021, 2:50 pm

Colombian journalist Luis Carlos Ayala survives shooting

At about 8:30 p.m. on April 20, an unidentified man aboard a motorcycle shot and slightly injured Ayala, who works as a freelance photojournalist and often contributes to the independent news website Colombia Informa, in the western city of Cali... Ayala told CPJ that he was at a friend’s house when a man on a motorcycle called out his name and started shooting at him. “I began to run and move about so he couldn’t hit me. One shot grazed my chin. Another shot grazed my right arm,” Ayala told CPJ. He said that his injuries were superficial and that he did not require medical treatment...


Unidentified man attacks Italian TV crew with metal chain, injuring 3

On April 11, an unidentified man attacked La Gatta and two Rete 4 support staffers while they were conducting interviews in the northwestern city of Cuneo... the team was reporting on the illegal occupation of houses in the area for the privately owned broadcaster’s “Fuori dal Coro” program, and when they approached a woman to interview her, the woman shouted at them and became angry. The woman’s partner then attacked the reporting team, punching them and hitting them with a metal chain on their arms, legs, and chests... The crew took refuge in the TV station’s car, where they called the police, while the man used the chain to smash the windows of the car...


Both from CPJ

88John5918
Apr. 28, 2021, 12:10 am

‘An example to many’: journalist Maria Ressa wins Unesco press freedom prize (Guardian)

The UN’s cultural agency has awarded its annual press freedom prize to Philippine journalist Maria Ressa whose reporting has made her a target of her country’s judiciary and online hate campaigns... She has been involved in many international initiatives to promote press freedom, and arrested several times “for alleged crimes related to the exercise of her profession”, Unesco said. She has also been subject to a sustained campaign of gendered online abuse, threats, and harassment, the agency said in a statement. At one point she received an average of over 90 hateful messages an hour on Facebook, it said. “Maria Ressa’s unerring fight for freedom of expression is an example for many journalists around the world,” jury chair Marilu Mastrogiovanni said in the statement. “Her case is emblematic of global trends that represent a real threat to press freedom, and therefore to democracy,” Mastrogiovanni said...


Mexican state authorities order website to remove articles critical of political candidate (CPJ)

On March 23, Dianeth Pérez Arreola, an investigative reporter and the website’s founder, received a letter from the office of the Special Prosecutor for Attention to Electoral Crimes of Baja California state, ordering her to remove any references to Natalia Rivera, a local political candidate, from the outlet’s website... On April 19, Pérez Arreola receive two additional letters, which CPJ reviewed—one from the Baja California state prosecutor’s office and one from the office of the Special Prosecutor for Electoral Crimes of Sonora state—again ordering her to refrain from publishing any content referencing Rivera. The letters warned that Pérez Arreola could be arrested or fined if she refused to comply...


Two Spanish journalists and Irish citizen killed by jihadists in Burkina Faso (Guardian)

Two Spanish journalists and an Irish national have been killed after they were ambushed by jihadists, while on an anti-poaching mission in Burkina Faso, the Spanish government has said...


89John5918
Apr. 29, 2021, 12:00 am

Zimbabwe court quashes charges against journalist Hopewell Chin’ono (Guardian)

Zimbabwe’s high court has quashed charges of communicating false information levelled against the journalist and government critic Hopewell Chin’ono, saying the law used by police to arrest him in January no longer exists...


Russian journalist Timur Mazayev receives death threats over news outlet’s Instagram post (CPJ)

On April 14, a man identifying himself as Zelimkhan Bitarov, the son of former North Ossetia ruler Vyacheslav Bitarov, called Mazayev, chief editor of the independent news website Ossetia News, and threatened to kill him, his colleagues, and his family over a post on the outlet’s Instagram account...

90John5918
Apr. 29, 2021, 11:21 pm

Venezuelan National Union of Journalists office destroyed in arson attack

On April 19, at around 4 a.m., unidentified individuals set fire to the regional headquarters of the National Union of Journalists (CNP) in the city of Cumaná, in the northeastern state of Sucre...


Russian court jails journalist Sergey Stepanov for 30 days over Navalny protest coverage

Yesterday, the Oktyabrsky District Court in the central Russian city of Tambov sentenced Stepanov, a freelance correspondent for Finnish TV and radio broadcaster IRR-TV, to 30 days in detention for allegedly participating in an unsanctioned protest on April 21... Turbin told CPJ that the court hearing took only 15 minutes, and the judge disregarded Stepanov’s press card and assignment sheet showing that he was covering the protest in support of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny as a journalist, and not participating in it...


Both from CPJ

91John5918
Apr. 30, 2021, 11:51 pm

Greek police arrest 3 suspects in alleged assassination plot of journalist Kostas Vaxevanis

On April 23, Vaxevanis, an investigative journalist and editor of the Documento newspaper, published an article in the paper stating that he had been told that a contract had been tendered for his assassination, and that the recent subject of a Documento investigation was “in search of someone in the criminal underworld to execute a contract for him.” The reporting subject was identified in that article as Menios Fourthiotis, a TV presenter for the privately owned broadcaster New Epsilon TV, whom Vaxevanis had recently accused of fabricating his journalistic credentials. On April 27, Athens police raided Fourthiotis’ home and arrested him and two others, and are investigating them for alleged weapons violations and in relation to a complaint Vaxevanis filed with authorities on April 24...


The ‘voice of the people’: Anastasia Mejía vows to keep reporting after Guatemala arrest

On September 22, 2020, the Guatemalan National Civil Police (PNC) arrested both Mejía and Petrona Siy, a local Indigenous leader and the head of the merchants’ association, without a warrant. The Guatemalan prosecutor’s office accused Mejía of participating in the protest and charged her with sedition, aggravated attack, arson, and aggravated robbery, as CPJ documented at the time. Mejía was imprisoned without trial for 37 days in a penitentiary center in Quetzaltenango...


Both from CPJ

92John5918
Mai 2, 2021, 11:46 pm

UN catalogues ‘chilling tide of abuse’ against female journalists (Guardian)

An epidemic of online violence against female journalists worldwide is undermining their reporting, spilling over into real-life attacks and harassment, and puts their health and professional prospects in jeopardy, the UN has warned. The avalanche of misogynistic abuse and threats is not only damaging women working in media, it is also weaponised “to undercut public trust in critical journalism and facts in general”, a report commissioned by the UN’s cultural agency Unesco has found...

93John5918
Mai 3, 2021, 11:47 pm

Kyrgyz journalist Kanat Kanimetov questioned, family harassed by authorities (CPJ)

On March 11, officers of the Kyrgyz State Committee for National Security (GKNB) summoned Kanimetov, a reporter and presenter with the independent television broadcaster Aprel, to their headquarters in Bishkek, the capital, and interrogated him in connection with a criminal case he previously reported on... Although Kanimetov was summoned as a witness, investigators questioned him as if he was a suspect in a criminal case, but did not accuse him of any specific crimes... Separately, in early April, police questioned several of Kanimetov’s relatives about his whereabouts and also questioned their neighbors...

94John5918
Mai 5, 2021, 11:37 pm

Equipped by US, Israeli firms, police in Botswana search phones for sources

Dikologang told CPJ that he refused to reveal his sources – but he did provide the password to his phone. Police then “successfully extracted” and “thoroughly analyzed” thousands of the journalist’s messages, contacts, images, audio files, and videos, as well social media accounts and applications, according to an affidavit that they submitted to court to support the ongoing prosecution. Other police documents reviewed by CPJ say Orange Botswana provided mobile account information for Dikologang and his co-accused, as well as another newspaper editor who was questioned during the investigation.

To examine the phone, police used a Universal Forensic Extraction Device (UFED) sold by Israel-based Cellebrite and a Forensic Toolkit (FTK) from U.S.-based AccessData, according to the affidavit from the Botswana Police Service Digital Forensics Laboratory, which CPJ reviewed. Websites run by the two companies advertise their technologies’ utility for extracting information from phones and computers, as well as breaking into locked devices and decrypting information.

The search of a journalist’s phone in detention exemplifies the threat digital forensics technologies pose to privacy and press freedom around the world...


Cuban journalist Mary Karla Ares detained over protest coverage

On April 30, at about 2 p.m., agents with the Cuban Revolutionary Police and the Political Police arrested Ares, a reporter for the community newspaper Amanecer Habanero, in Havana and took her to a police station in the Havana Playa municipality, according to news reports and Normando Hernández, general manager for the Cuban Institute for Freedom of Expression and the Press (ICLEP), a local press freedom organization... Ares remains in that police station as of today, and authorities are investigating her for criminal “public disorder” over her coverage of recent protests, according to those sources. Ares has not had access to a lawyer or her family since she was arrested...


Both from CPJ

95John5918
Bearbeitet: Mai 7, 2021, 3:07 am

The Guardian view on our 200th birthday: reasons to be cheerful (Guardian)

The bicentenary of the Guardian is a cause for celebration and reflection. The paper was born of political outsiders in a country then run by a landed aristocracy. With its roots in religious dissent and with a desire to spread a developing system of liberal and progressive values, the Guardian has been a political force ever since. It has been a mouthpiece for reform, with a seriousness of purpose and an irreverent eye. The world has changed immeasurably since 1821, but the Guardian has remained steadfastly independent, guided by its commitment to accuracy and fairness...


Kenyan Catholic Bishop Cautions against Armchair Journalism, Urges Evidence-based Reports (ACI Africa)

A Catholic Bishop in Kenya has challenged journalists in the East African nation to engage in evidence-based reporting, cautioning against armchair journalism... the theme of the May 16 event, “come and See”, invites journalists to encounter the people in their respective situations before reporting about them. “Communicators are invited to hit the streets. Go out and discover. Take your cameras, take your pen and your paper and go to the situation of the people and write from what you see and experience”...


And three from CPJ this morning:

Peruvian authorities threaten to seize documents from Ojo Público on corruption reporting

On April 5, Peruvian public prosecutor Yovana Mori García sent 13 petitions to Ojo Público, an independent investigative news website, demanding the outlet turn over documents relating to money laundering investigations into real estate, mining, timber, and agro-industrial companies as well as a former presidential candidate...


Reporting crew for Mtavari Arkhi broadcaster attacked, harassed in Georgia

On May 4, a group of unidentified men attacked and harassed Kekelia, a reporter with the pro-opposition Georgian broadcaster Mtavari Arkhi, and Kvaratskhelia, a camera operator with the broadcaster, while they were reporting in the eastern village of Udabno...


Russia couldn’t block Telegram, but harassment, propaganda make it hostile for journalists

Telegram was meant to be blocked in Russia in April 2020 when Aleksandr Pichugin published a satirical article about the spread of COVID-19 on his channel Sorokin Khvost – an allusion to a Russian version of the saying, “A little bird told me.” Four days later, uniformed officers came to the journalist’s home and pushed him to the floor in front of his pregnant wife... Telegram resisted Russia’s attempts to censor it, which CPJ and other observers condemned at the time. The platform remained popular among independent journalists until Roskomnadzor, the media and telecommunications regulator, finally lifted its 26-month ban in June 2020... Yet while they couldn’t block Telegram, Russian officials have gradually curbed its utility for journalists, punishing individuals like Pichugin while distributing state propaganda and allegedly facilitating harassment in Telegram channels... Today, despite Telegram’s resilience, journalism on the platform is suffering in Russia, Pichugin told CPJ. “We used to laugh at Roskomnadzor when it tried to block Telegram in 2018,” he said. Since his arrest, however, he has only used his Telegram channel to republish work he’s done elsewhere...

96John5918
Bearbeitet: Mai 9, 2021, 12:14 am

Trump officials obtained Washington Post reporters' phone data (BBC)

Trump justice department officials in the US secretly obtained phone records of journalists working for the Washington Post newspaper. Home, mobile and office telephones of the three reporters were accessed for three months in 2017, the Post said. The paper said this was related to its reporting of the Russian role in the 2016 presidential election that brought Donald Trump into office. The Post said it was "deeply troubled by this use of government power"...

97John5918
Mai 10, 2021, 12:08 am

Online abuse of female journalists: a problem for all (Guardian)

A new report by the UN’s cultural agency, Unesco, makes horrifying reading. A global survey of 901 journalists from 125 countries found that female journalists across the world are under unprecedented levels of attack. The intent, says the UN, is to belittle, humiliate, shame, induce fear and ultimately discredit female reporters; and to undercut public trust in critical journalism and facts...

It is depressing how organised the abuse often is. But what it most striking is how frequently it is not only tolerated at the highest levels, but incited from there – from Rodrigo Duterte, president of the Philippines, musing that journalists are not exempt from assassination, to Donald Trump’s attacks on specific reporters...

Anti-press trolling, especially that directed at women, is a form of hate speech, intended to silence and intimidate. At least a third of female journalists, say the UN, reported self-censorship. The chilling effect of mob censorship cannot be underestimated and must be urgently addressed, with a view to stopping and rolling back its baleful spread.

98John5918
Mai 10, 2021, 11:56 pm

The Guardian is now 200 years old. A couple of celebratory articles caught my eye.

'People got nervous if a bag was left on a chair': Paul Johnson on Northern Ireland

The Guardian’s current Ireland correspondent speaks to a predecessor to find out how the job has changed over the past 30 years...


What we got wrong: the Guardian’s worst errors of judgment over 200 years

A daily newspaper cannot publish for 200 years without getting some things wrong. This one has made its share of mistakes.

There will always be errors of news judgment given the nature of the work. Tight deadlines meant the sinking of the Titanic was relegated to a small spot on page 9 in 1912; errors of scientific understanding resulted in a 1927 article that promoted the virtues of asbestos, and others in the late 1970s that warned of a looming ice age.

But the most noticeable missteps stem not from the news pages but from the editorial column. For it is here that readers find out what the paper thinks about the great issues of the day. And it is here that mistakes are inked most indelibly into history, whether they relate to suffrage, reform or, most notably in recent years, the debate over Brexit.

To err is human. But making the wrong call is both inevitable and painful. To see why the Guardian thinks the way it does, it is useful to start with the interests it originally sought to advance. The Manchester Guardian was born of moderate radicalism, and began life in 1821 as a mouthpiece for male middle-class political reform...


That second one is important. Journalists make mistakes, just like anyone else. But responsible journalism is ready to admit and correct its mistakes, to analyse its dynamics, to be open and transparent. That's not the same as fake news.

99John5918
Mai 12, 2021, 12:22 am

Idaho attorney files subpoena for testimony of reporter Nate Eaton

Yesterday, Nate Eaton, the news director at the local website EastIdahoNews.com, posted on Twitter an image of a subpoena ordering him to appear in a local county court on June 9 to give witness testimony in a conspiracy case he has covered extensively... “Attorneys should refrain from subpoenaing journalists, and U.S. courts should not grant such orders, which imperil reporters’ abilities to do their jobs. EastIdahoNews.com reporter Nate Eaton belongs in the courtroom’s press box and not on the witness stand”...


Police detain, fine 2 journalists over corruption reporting in Russian republic of Tatarstan

On May 9, the Vysokogorsky District Court in Russia’s central Republic of Tatarstan convicted Solovyov and Manzhukov, correspondents for the independent news website Rosderzhava, on charges of interfering with traffic and disobeying police...


Mexican reporter Benjamín Morales shot and killed in Sonora

In the evening of May 2, Morales’ family lost contact with the journalist in Sonoyta, a small town in the northern Mexican state of Sonora; in the morning of May 3, local police found the journalist’s abandoned vehicle and then found his body, which had several gunshot wounds... Police said that a piece of cardboard with “a message” had been left with the journalist’s body, but did not disclose the contents of that message...


All from CPJ

100John5918
Mai 14, 2021, 12:04 am

Turkish journalist Deniz Yücel charged with ‘degrading’ the country

Yesterday, Turkish prosecutors charged Yücel, the former Turkey correspondent for the German newspaper Die Welt, with “publicly degrading the Turkish nation and the State of the Republic of Turkey” in two articles from 2016... “Turkish authorities are going out of their way to concoct new charges to harass Deniz Yücel, whose only crime was that he did his job as a member of the press”...


Belarusian authorities detain 2 journalists covering opposition trial

Yesterday, police in the eastern city of Mohilev arrested Burakau, a freelance reporter working with German public broadcaster Deutsche Welle, and Laptsevich, a correspondent for the local independent news website... Police took the journalists to the Leninsky police station in Mohilev, where they were charged with “participation in an unauthorized event” stemming from their coverage of the trial of members of an opposition group...


Both from CPJ

101John5918
Mai 21, 2021, 12:02 am

Demonstrators throw rocks, firecrackers at news crews in Berlin (CPJ)

On May 15, members of a pro-Palestine protest in Berlin attacked at least three news crews and shouted insults at German and Israeli journalists...


Trump administration secretly obtained CNN reporter's phone and email records (CNN)

The Trump administration secretly sought and obtained the 2017 phone and email records of a CNN correspondent, the latest instance where federal prosecutors have taken aggressive steps targeting journalists in leak investigations...

102John5918
Mai 24, 2021, 12:10 am

Belarus accused of ‘hijacking’ Ryanair flight diverted to arrest blogger (Guardian)

Belarus has been accused of hijacking a European jetliner and engaging in an act of state terrorism when it forced a Ryanair flight to perform an emergency landing in Minsk after a bomb threat and arrested an opposition blogger critical of authoritarian president Alexander Lukashenko. Roman Protasevich, a former editor of the influential Telegram channels Nexta and Nexta Live, was detained by police after his flight was diverted to Minsk national airport. Minsk confirmed that Lukashenko ordered his military to scramble a Mig-29 fighter to escort the plane...

“If aircraft can be forced to the ground … in order to punish the political opponents of tyrants, then journalists here in the UK, politicians anywhere in Europe will find it harder to speak out”...


Ryanair plane: Western powers voice outrage at plane 'hijacking' (BBC)

Western countries have expressed outrage at the forced diversion of a plane carrying a Belarusian activist on an internal EU flight on Sunday... Belarus forced the plane, which was bound for Lithuania, to land in Minsk claiming a bomb threat to the aircraft. It arrested the Belarusian journalist and activist Roman Protasevich...

103John5918
Mai 25, 2021, 12:22 am

Detained Belarusian journalist Raman Pratasevich appears in ‘confession’ video (CPJ)

Today, Pratasevich appeared in a 29-second video first published by the pro-government Telegram channel Zhyoltiye Slivy. In that video, which CPJ reviewed, Pratasevich can be seen with his hands clasped tightly in front of him and apparent bruises or scuff marks on his forehead; he says that he had no complaints about his detention, was cooperating with authorities, and confessed to “organizing mass riots” in Minsk. CPJ was unable to verify the time or circumstances under which the video was recorded...


Associated Press journalists condemn decision to fire Emily Wilder (Guardian)

Journalists at the Associated Press published an open letter on Monday, decrying the decision to fire Emily Wilder, a young employee targeted by a Republican smear campaign regarding her pro-Palestinian advocacy while a student. “It has left our colleagues – particularly emerging journalists – wondering how we treat our own, what culture we embrace and what values we truly espouse as a company,” the journalists wrote...

The dismissal came days after a building which housed an AP office in Gaza was destroyed by Israeli action...

104John5918
Mai 26, 2021, 12:38 am

Raman Pratasevich: the Belarus journalist captured by a fighter jet (Guardian)

Friends describe arrest of influential opposition journalist as an act of ‘personal revenge’ by the country’s president...


How Belarus’s 'aviation piracy' broke international law (France 24)

Belarus’s forced diversion of a plane to arrest dissident journalist Roman Protasevich has prompted outrage. FRANCE 24 looks at precisely how it broke international law and what – if anything – can be done about it...


Belarusian authorities briefly detain 4 Tut.by journalists; at least 13 staff remain in custody (CPJ)

police in Minsk, the capital, arrested Tut.by reporters Anastasiya Prudnikava and Dzianis Burkouski, and social media editors Maksim Pushkin and Ala Burkouskaya... Officers took the four to the Department of Financial Investigation and released them this evening... Aliaksandra Pushkina, Tut.by’s public relations manager, told CPJ in a phone interview that she did not know anything about what happened to the journalists while they were in custody, or whether they have been charged with crimes, because they all signed nondisclosure agreements upon their release and were unable to tell her such details. She added that the journalists did not have access to a lawyer during their detentions. At least 13 other Tut.by employees remain in detention following authorities’ crackdown on the outlet on May 18 as part of an investigation into alleged tax evasion...


Supporters of Peruvian presidential candidate Pedro Castillo harass, assault 2 journalists covering rally (CPJ)

On May 19, at about 5:15 p.m., a group of people at a rally in support of presidential candidate Pedro Castillo assaulted Medina, a reporter for the privately owned television outlets América Televisión and Canal N, and Brown, a camera operator for those outlets, while they were covering the event in the southern city of Ayacucho...


GCHQ’s mass data interception violated right to privacy, court rules (Guardian)

The UK spy agency GCHQ’s methods for bulk interception of online communications violated the right to privacy and the regime for collection of data was unlawful, the grand chamber of the European court of human rights has ruled... the judges also found the bulk interception regime breached the right to freedom of expression and contained insufficient protections for confidential journalistic material...


‘The Bard of the West Country’: tributes to David Foot, who has died aged 92 (Guardian)

Tributes have been paid to the sportswriter David Foot, the doyen of West Country sportswriters who has died at the age of 92... During a varied writing career Foot was also a theatre critic and a feature writer but will perhaps be remembered most fondly for his appreciation of cricket...

105John5918
Mai 26, 2021, 11:30 pm

Associated Press vows to defend staff against online attacks after Emily Wilder firing (Guardian)

Management at the Associated Press have told staff that they stand behind their decision to fire newly hired reporter Emily Wilder who was targeted by a Republican smear campaign regarding her pro-Palestinian advocacy while a student. However, they also admitted to mishandling the situation and vowed to defend their staff against online attacks...


Turkmen security officials threaten, harass families of two exiled journalists (CPJ)

On a number of occasions between March and May this year, officers of the Ministry of National Security harassed and threatened the relatives of Rozybai Jumamuradov, a reporter working with the independent Vienna-based news site Khronika Turkmenistana, and Devlet Bayhan, a journalist who also collaborates with the same outlet... In one episode at the start of May, security officers summoned Jumamuradov’s 14-year-old nephew and questioned him about his contact with his uncle, shouting at the boy and threatening to jail him and his family and kill Jumamuradov... Bayhan and Jumamuradov have been forced to live and work outside of Turkmenistan since 1994 and 2011, respectively, out of concern for their own safety and liberty...


Canadian police bar journalists from covering anti-logging protests (CPJ)

A coalition of Canadian news organizations and the Canadian Association of Journalists issued a letter today detailing the RCMP’s repeated denial of access to reporters at Vancouver Island on the basis of a court injunction. The letter called for that injunction to be modified to protect journalists from interference...


Unidentified men attack, bind, and gag Pakistani journalist Asad Ali Toor at his home in Islamabad (CPJ)

Yesterday evening, three unidentified men beat, bound, and gagged Toor inside his apartment in Islamabad, according to news reports and the journalist, who spoke to CPJ in a phone interview. CCTV footage following the attack shows Toor struggling to walk in his apartment building’s lobby as passersby helped remove the bindings. The journalist told CPJ that his arms were bloodied and bruised in the attack, and he required stitches on his elbow...


Belarus plane: Lukashenko hits back at condemnation of journalist's arrest (BBC)

The president of Belarus has said his critics are "strangling" his country and waging "hybrid warfare". Alexander Lukashenko told parliament common sense had been abandoned and "many red lines" crossed as Western countries imposed sanctions on Belarus. He was defending the move to forcibly divert a Ryanair plane, which was flying from Greece to Lithuania, to land in Belarus on Sunday. A Belarusian journalist who is a critic of Mr Lukashenko was arrested...


The BBC visits the colleagues of the arrested journalist, Roman Protesevich (BBC)

Roman Protesevich, the journalist arrested off the diverted Ryan Air flight, is described a personal enemy of President Lukashenko. How did he become such a target for Belarus’ regime? The 26-year-old was the news editor of the enormously successful opposition news channel Nexta during the height of last summer’s mass protests in Belarus. The Telegram channel played a major role in organising the protests. The BBC’s Europe correspondent Jean Mackenzie has visited Nexta’s headquarters in Poland to speak to Roman’s former colleagues, who say they now fear for their lives...

106John5918
Mai 28, 2021, 12:17 am

Cuban journalist Mary Karla Ares transferred to prison (CPJ)

Yesterday, authorities transferred Ares to the Western Women’s Prison in the La Lisa municipality of Havana, after holding her in a police facility since her April 30 arrest, according to a report by the Cuban Institute for Freedom of Expression and the Press (ICLEP). Authorities are investigating her for criminal public disorder and “resistance,” according to that report. “By transferring Mary Karla Ares to the Western Women’s Prison, Cuban authorities have escalated their unjust treatment of a journalist who is being punished simply for doing her job”...

107John5918
Mai 29, 2021, 12:32 am

Chicago mayor sued by journalist for limiting interviews to reporters of color (Guardian)

A white reporter for a rightwing media outlet founded by the Fox News host Tucker Carlson has sued Chicago’s mayor, Lori Lightfoot, over her temporary decision to grant interviews only to journalists of color. Thomas Catenacci and the Daily Caller News Foundation argue in the lawsuit that Lightfoot discriminated against the reporter because of his race...

Lightfoot, Chicago’s first Black female and first openly gay mayor, said on 19 May she would grant interviews marking the second anniversary of her inauguration on 20 May exclusively to journalists of color. She said she meant to draw attention to the fact that the press corps is “overwhelmingly white” and male in a city where white people make up only about a third of the population... “The fact that the City Hall press corps is overwhelmingly white, has very little in the way of diversity, is an embarrassment,” Lightfoot said. “One day out of 365, I say that I’m going to mark the anniversary of my two years in office by giving exclusive one-on-ones to journalists of color, and the world loses its mind”...

A University of Chicago law professor, Geoffrey Stone, told the Chicago Tribune he expected the lawsuit to be thrown out. He noted officials commonly pick outlets to favor, and that Lightfoot said her decision was not a blanket policy. “Given that she’s talking only about one day, it seems to be blown out of proportion, to make a fuss over it,” Stone said.

108John5918
Jun. 1, 2021, 11:57 pm

Two from the Guardian this morning.

‘No political story allowed’: Hong Kong broadcaster falls silent on sensitive subjects

ormally at this time of year Hong Kong media are bustling to prepare coverage of Friday’s anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre which, before Covid restrictions hit, usually included a huge vigil in Victoria Park. The event is illegal in China but had been proudly held in Hong Kong for decades. But this year journalists at the respected public broadcaster RTHK say they’ve been told to stand down. “We were informed that no political story is allowed,” says Emily*, an RTHK employee who, along with others interviewed for this article, asked for anonymity to speak freely. “We think it’s kind of funny because what isn’t a political story now?”...


UK Journalists asked to share stories of abuse in government safety drive

Journalists are being encouraged to share their experiences of being threatened, abused and intimidated as part of a government drive to protect their safety. The Home Office said the call for evidence would help to better understand the scale of the problem, the criminal justice system’s response to it and the impact that such incidents have on the industry...

109John5918
Bearbeitet: Jun. 3, 2021, 12:30 am

Uganda: Two summoned after reporting on BBC investigation (BBC)

The editor of one of Uganda's biggest newspapers has been summoned for questioning by police after reporting findings from a BBC investigation into last year's police killings in Kampala. Tabu Butagira is the editor the Daily Monitor which ran the story on its front page on 31 May. Tony Glencross, the managing director of Nation Media Group, which owns the newspaper, has also been summoned. The two men are suspected of publishing false news, libel, and incitement...


Nicaraguan prosecutors question at least 16 journalists, threaten criminal investigation into Univision correspondent (CPJ)

Since late May, authorities have summoned at least 16 journalists to give witness testimony relating to a money laundering investigation into Cristiana Chamorro, a prospective candidate in the country’s November presidential elections and the former head of a free expression organization...

110John5918
Bearbeitet: Jun. 4, 2021, 12:34 am

Mexican reporter Luis Aguilar survives knife attack in Pénjamo (CPJ)

At about 2:30 a.m. on May 21, an unidentified man attacked Aguilera with a knife as he returned to his home in Pénjamo, a city in the central Mexican state of Guanajuato... “I believe he was hiding behind a tree. I didn’t see him coming. I think he was trying to cut my throat.” The journalist wrestled himself free from the attacker and ran to the home of a friend, he said. Aguilera received cuts on his arms and neck and underwent surgery at a local hospital... “Journalist Luis Aguilar thankfully escaped a recent knife attack alive, but he is only the latest journalist in Mexico to face a life-threatening assault,” said Jan-Albert Hootsen, CPJ’s Mexico representative. “Mexican authorities cannot continue ignoring the incessant violence against the press in the country"...

111John5918
Jun. 5, 2021, 12:36 am

Ecuadorian journalist Calixto Zambrano survives shooting (CPJ)

At about 7:30 p.m. on May 28, two unidentified men on a motorcycle approached Zambrano as he was returning to his home in the western town of El Carmen, and one of the men pulled out a pistol and fired several shots. Two of the shots hit Zambrano as he ran away...

112John5918
Jun. 6, 2021, 12:44 am

US Department of Justice will no longer obtain reporters’ phone records (Guardian)

The US Department of Justice (DoJ) said on Saturday it will no longer secretly obtain reporters’ phone records during leak investigations, a practice decried by news organizations and press freedom groups. The reversal followed a pledge last month by Joe Biden, who said it was “simply, simply wrong” to seize journalists’ records and that he would not permit the practice...

113John5918
Jun. 7, 2021, 12:12 am

‘The darkest days are coming’: Myanmar’s journalists suffer at hands of junta (Guardian)

Journalism has been outlawed in all but name since the coup, with reporters and editors fleeing the country or leading double lives to survive...

114John5918
Jun. 8, 2021, 1:07 pm

Greek police detain and question Dutch TV crew covering refugees (CPJ)

On May 29, police in Dikaia, a Greek town near the borders of Bulgaria and Turkey, stopped a reporting team from the Dutch public broadcaster VPRO while they were covering refugees in the area... Police said that the crew, comprised of Vermeulen, a camera operator, sound engineer, researcher, and translator, were in a restricted area, ordered them to stop filming, and then took all five to a local police station for questioning, according to those sources. At the station, officers demanded to see the team’s video footage, which they refused to hand over; after about an hour, police told them not to return to that area and then released them without charge...


Guatemalan ex-official’s family members sue 2 journalists under violence against women law (CPJ)

In May 21, two relatives of Miguel Martínez, the former director of the Government Center presidential commission, a branch of the Guatemalan executive, filed a criminal suit against del Cid and Figueroa, both reporters at the investigative news website Vox Populi, alleging that they violated laws pertaining to coercion and violence against women... In the suit, María Luisa Morales Gatica, the ex-official’s mother, and Claudia Ivonne Martínez Morales, his sister, claimed they had experienced emotional and psychological trauma due to del Cid and Figueroa’s work, and that it violated the country’s Law Against Femicide and Other Forms of Violence Against Women; they did not specify which articles caused those alleged injuries...

115John5918
Bearbeitet: Jun. 22, 2021, 3:50 am

Two journalists killed in Mexico, meaning three dead so far this year

Gustavo Sánchez Cabrera shot dead Thursday, and Enrique Garcia killed Wednesday, apparently during work as ride-hail driver... bring{ing} to three the number killed so far this year in the country. Two other reporters have disappeared...


The harassment of the BBC’s Nicholas Watt was all too predictable

In recent years, along with other journalists, I have been targeted by members of the far right. Yet we’re failing to address dangerous radicalisation...


Met police makes second arrest after BBC’s Nick Watt confronted on street

Police have arrested a second man on suspicion of harassing the BBC journalist Nick Watt after footage emerged online last week of the political editor being confronted and chased by a group of protesters...


All three from the Guardian, plus:

Hong Kong sends 500 officers in pro-democracy paper raid (BBC)

Some 500 policemen raided the offices of pro-democracy paper Apple Daily in Hong Kong, alleging its reports breached a national security law. Police also arrested the editor-in-chief and four other executives at their homes. It also froze HK$18m ($2.3m; £1.64m) of assets owned by three companies linked to Apple Daily. The paper is owned by Jimmy Lai, who is in jail on a string of charges. Apple Daily is known to be critical of the mainland Chinese leadership...

116John5918
Jun. 23, 2021, 5:16 am

I've been without a laptop and a decent internet connection for a week or so, but here are a few headlines from the Committee to Protect Journalists which appeared during that period.

Police investigate The Intercept Brasil editor Leandro Demori over reporting on police killings

Journalist İbrahim Akkuş beaten with pipe in Turkey

EU must highlight press freedom in Turkey during upcoming talks


Salvadoran court orders Revista Factum to take down reporting on murder case



Russian authorities open court case against journalist Yury Dud for distributing ‘drug propaganda’


Colombian journalist Pincen Mora survives shooting attempt at home in Medellín

Former Mexican mayor convicted for role in murder of reporter Miroslava Breach

CPJ highlights risks for journalists who flee; calls on nations to create special emergency visas

German law increases government surveillance and hacking powers, removes protection for journalists

Brazilian Supreme Court rules in favor of photojournalist Alex Silveira, injured by police while covering protest in 2000

Kazakh newspaper Aq Zhayiq and editor Azamat Maitanov receive death threats

Police detain 2 journalists who covered art performance in Moscow’s Red Square

European soccer association UEFA denies accreditations to at least 6 journalists, citing failed background checks by Russia and Azerbaijan

Why authoritarian governments force journalists like Belarus’s Raman Pratasevich into public confessions

Slovak Supreme Court cancels acquittal of primary suspects in journalist Ján Kuciak’s murder

Uzbek reporting team assaulted while reporting at Andijan mayor’s office

Turkish journalist Sinan Aygül sentenced to jail over sexual assault reporting

Journalist Alan Weisman arrested, strip-searched while covering anti-pipeline protest in Minnesota

Turkish journalist Ahmet Atmaca beaten in Gaziantep

Unidentified men attack Russian RFE/RL correspondent Andrey Afanasyev

CPJ welcomes 2nd conviction in case of slain Mexican journalist Javier Valdez Cárdenas

Turkish presidency reintroduces press card controls that court found restrictive

CPJ Announces Leadership Transition

And from the Guardian this morning:

Top Nicaraguan journalist flees country amid escalating crackdown

118John5918
Jun. 25, 2021, 2:59 am

Photojournalist Ian Willms detained while covering police in Toronto (CPJ)

At about 1:30 p.m. on June 22, police detained Willms, a freelance photojournalist, after he climbed into a fenced-off area while attempting to photograph officers forcing homeless people out of Toronto’s Trinity Bellwoods Park, according to the journalist... The officers told Willms that he was being arrested for obstruction, trespassing, and causing a disturbance, and drove him around for 1.5 hours before bringing him to Toronto’s Police 11 Division office...


Uzbek news websites Kun.uz and Azon.uz fined for allegedly publishing ‘religious material’ without approval (CPJ)

On June 21, the Chilonzor District Court in Tashkent, the capital, fined several people affiliated with both websites for allegedly publishing religious material without first submitting it to the state Committee for Religious Affairs for approval...


Murdoch seeks to remove editorial independence rules at the Times (Guardian)

Rupert Murdoch has asked the government to abolish the legal restraints on him interfering in the editorial independence of the Times and the Sunday Times that were put in place when he first bought the newspapers. At the moment the two newspapers are required to have largely separate editorial teams, while Murdoch nominally has to answer to a group of independent directors on key editorial matters. News UK has now asked the government to abolish the independent directors, arguing that they are no longer required and were designed in a pre-internet era. The company argues that there is no need for the legal protections because it would be “economically irrational” for Murdoch to interfere in the editorial position of the Times or the Sunday Times, as this could cause sales of his newspapers to fall...

119John5918
Jun. 26, 2021, 2:30 am

Nicaraguan police detain journalist Miguel Mendoza for alleged treason (CPJ)

At about 9 p.m. on June 21, officers with the Nicaraguan National Police detained Mendoza and raided his home in Managua, according to news reports and a press release published by the police that evening. The police press release accused Mendoza of a number of crimes that fall under Nicaragua’s broad definition of treason, but did not state how he allegedly broke those laws. Mendoza’s family has been unable to locate him since his detention...

120John5918
Bearbeitet: Jun. 28, 2021, 6:51 am

US journalist says he was tortured during detention in Myanmar (Guardian)

Myanmar’s security forces punched, slapped and beat a US journalist and kept him blindfolded for more than a week of interrogation, he said after being deported to the United States following more than three months in detention. Nathan Maung, 44, the editor-in-chief of the online news platform Kamayut Media, was detained in a raid on 9 March and freed on 15 June. He said his colleague Hanthar Nyein, who remains in detention, had been tortured more harshly, as had other people he met in prison...


Hong Kong pro-democracy media buckles under China pressure (BBC)

The continued targeting of pro-democracy journalists and publications is sending a chilling message to Hong Kong's media, with experts warning of a devastating impact on press freedom in the city... On Sunday night, police announced that they had arrested a former senior journalist with the now-shut Apple Daily at the airport as he was trying to leave the city. Apple Daily closed down after officials arrested its senior leadership under the city's controversial national security law and froze its assets. Its owner, media mogul Jimmy Lai, was already in jail on a string of charges. News of the arrest came hours after Stand News - popular with pro-democracy supporters - said it would shelve commentary pieces over fears of a crackdown...

121margd
Jun. 28, 2021, 8:58 am

Hong Kong Editor's note:
CNN has launched the Meanwhile in China newsletter, a three-times-a-week update exploring what you need to know about the country's rise and how it impacts the world. Sign up here.

https://edition.cnn.com/specials/meanwhile-in-china

122John5918
Jun. 28, 2021, 11:59 pm

Turkish police assault and detain AFP photographer Bülent Kılıç while covering Istanbul Pride march (CPJ)

On June 26, police officers in Istanbul detained Kılıç, chief Turkey photographer for the French news agency Agence France-Presse, while he was covering police breaking up a LGBTQ Pride march in the city... Officers hit Kılıç in the face with his camera and threw the camera to the ground, breaking it, and then pinned him to the ground by kneeling on his neck and back... Four officers detained Kılıç, and one pushed his neck into the ground while he struggled to breathe through his mask, he said in that interview, adding that the officers handcuffed him and briefly held him at the scene, and then released him without charge. “An attempt was made on my life. It was an attempted suffocation,” Kılıç tweeted after he was released...

123John5918
Jun. 29, 2021, 11:18 pm

Russian police raid journalists probing government corruption (Guardian)

Proekt website editors raided as they prepared to publish allegations against Putin’s interior minister Vladimir Kolokoltsev...


Same story from CPJ: Russian police interrogate 3 journalists with investigative outlet Proekt, raid apartments

And a few more from CPJ this morning:

Turkish journalist and press freedom advocate Hakkı Boltan sentenced to 2 years in prison for insulting president and prime minister

the 12th Diyarbakır Court of First Instance, in the southeastern city of Diyarbakır, convicted Boltan of insulting President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and former Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu, and sentenced him to two years and 17 days in prison, according to news reports and the journalist’s lawyer, Resul Tamur, who spoke to CPJ via messaging app. The sentence includes 14 months and 17 days for insulting Erdoğan, and 10 months for insulting Davutoğlu...


Mexican media worker Saúl Tijerina killed in Ciudad Acuña

Tijerina’s family lost contact with him early in the morning of June 22, and his body was found near his vehicle in Ciudad Acuña, in the northern Mexican state of Coahuila, later that morning with multiple stab wounds...


CPJ calls on U.S. to publish list of all websites recently seized in sanctions crackdown

The United States Justice Department should clarify its rationale for seizing dozens of media websites last week, and should publish a list of all websites targeted for allegedly violating sanctions, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today. On June 22, the Justice Department issued a statement saying that it had seized 33 websites affiliated with the Iranian Islamic Radio and Television Union and three linked to the Iraqi paramilitary group Kataeb Hezbollah, but did not identify the seized websites by name...

CPJ has identified 21 of the seized outlets, some of which are openly affiliated with Iran or Kataeb Hezbollah, but others of which publish content critical of authorities in Tehran or have stated that they operate independently...

124John5918
Jul. 1, 2021, 12:01 am

‘The most dangerous situation’: Serbian journalists accused of links to organized crime (CPJ)

In March, when a reporter at Serbian investigative news site KRIK asked President Aleksandar Vučić at a press conference about the government’s alleged links to organized crime, governing party politicians and pro-government media outlets turned the claim back on KRIK. They accused the journalists of being part of a criminal network, which KRIK has forcefully denied, as CPJ documented. The incident was par for the course for KRIK, which stands for the Crime and Corruption Reporting Network, a non-profit organization focused on improving investigative journalism in the country. Journalists there told CPJ that in the six years since KRIK’s founding, the outlet has faced repeated similar accusations as well as lawsuits by politicians and officials who are the subject of their reporting...


Ecuadorian journalist Luis Eduardo Vivanco receives death threats (CPJ)

On June 24, Vivanco, founder of the satirical news website La Posta, was walking his dog in Quito, the capital, when an unidentified man began screaming at him from a nearby car, he told CPJ via messaging app. The man then left the car and said, “Vivanco, you son of a bitch, I’m going to kill you.” The journalist recorded the encounter on his phone; he said the man left the scene after seeing that Vivanco was filming him. The following day, Vivanco received a WhatsApp message from an account he did not recognize, which he posted to Twitter, saying that a person identified as “Bearded Gil” was going to “kill you or shut your horn”...

125John5918
Jul. 2, 2021, 11:21 am

Colombian riot police beat 2 RCN Radio journalists documenting police violence (CPJ)

On June 29, Colombian police officers assaulted Katy Sánchez, a reporter, and Alexandra Molina, an intern, both with the independent broadcaster RCN Radio, while they covered anti-government protests in the capital, Bogotá... Sánchez told CPJ that she and Molina were filming members of the anti-riot police unit, known as ESMAD, beating and kicking a youth during the demonstrations, when officers attacked them. In a video recorded by Molina, the two journalists can be heard urging police to stop beating the youth, and then officers are seen accosting the reporters. Sánchez said one officer shoved her to the ground with his shield, kicked her in the back, and hit her with his nightstick, leaving her with a badly sprained left ankle and bloodied knees. Molina told CPJ that the same officer shoved her to the ground, but that she did not sustain serious injuries...

126John5918
Jul. 3, 2021, 12:34 am

Sudan releases Al Jazeera journalist as network demands answers for ‘humiliating kidnapping’ (Doha News)

Sudanese security forces released Al Jazeera journalist, Ali Abou Shaleh, on Wednesday, hours after abducting him while covering anti-government protests in central Khartoum, the Qatar-based news broadcaster reported. Abou Shaleh was in the capital to cover demonstrations that demanded the dismissal of Prime Minister Abdallah Hamdok as well as “correcting the course” of the revolution which disposed of former Sudanese President Omar Al-Bashir. Reporting on Al-Jazeera at the time of the incident, correspondent Al-Taher Al-Mardi said Sudanese armed forces took Abou Shaleh from the site to an “undisclosed location.” “The authorities didn’t give him time to introduce himself as a reporter for Al Jazeera, they took him right away,” Al-Mardi said. In a statement, Al-Jazeera condemned what it described as the “humiliating kidnapping” in which Abu Shaleh was illegally arrested while carrying out his job as a journalist...

127John5918
Jul. 6, 2021, 10:13 am

Iceland fishing company goes ‘guerilla’ on journalists who uncovered alleged corruption (CPJ)

When in March of this year a neighbor alerted Helgi Seljan, an investigative reporter for Iceland’s public broadcaster Ríkisútvarpið (RÚV), that she had seen someone lurking around his house, he was alarmed, he told CPJ in a video interview. Seljan said that the neighbor recognized the alleged lurker as Jón Óttar Ólafsson, a former police officer turned private detective. Ólafsson had occasionally appeared in social media videos by Icelandic fishing giant Samherji to defend the brand against claims of corruption in Seljan’s investigative reporting. In November 2019 RÚV reported in partnership with Icelandic news website Stundin and Qatari broadcaster Al-Jazeera that the company had allegedly bribed officials in Namibia with payments equating millions of dollars in exchange for the right to fish. In the past, Ólafsson had texted Seljan criticizing his reporting on the Namibia case. “Your lack of judgment is incredible!” read one text message, Seljan told CPJ via video call. Fielding criticism via text was one thing but having the man behind the criticism show up at his home was a “game changing moment,” Seljan told CPJ. “I have never thought that Samherji will go as far in its campaign and harass me and my family personally.” By then, for more than a year, Samherji had waged a campaign to discredit Seljan and his colleagues at RÚV’s investigative TV show, “Kveikur”...

128John5918
Bearbeitet: Jul. 7, 2021, 12:10 am

Crime reporter Peter R. de Vries shot in Amsterdam, hospitalized in critical condition

At about 7:30 p.m. today in Amsterdam, an unidentified attacker fired five shots at de Vries, an independent investigative journalist and crime reporter, according to multiple news reports. The attacker then fled the scene, and the journalist was taken to a local hospital in critical condition with a gunshot wound to the head, those reports said. The attack occurred just after de Vries appeared on the television show RTL Boulevard as a guest, according to those reports. De Vries has covered numerous high-profile criminal investigations, and previously received death threats in 2019 over his coverage of the killing of a teenager in Rotterdam, according to news reports. At the time of the attack, he was also working as an advisor to the prosecution’s key witness in the trial of an alleged drug kingpin, which put him on a “criminal underworld hit list,” reports said.


Haitian journalist Diego Charles shot and killed in Port-au-Prince

At about 11:00 p.m. on June 29, unidentified men riding a motorcycle shot and killed Charles at the entrance of his home in the Christ-Roi area in Port-au-Prince... The attackers also shot and killed political activist Marie Antoinette Duclair, who was inside a nearby car after driving Charles home following a meeting that both attended...


Journalists attacked by anti-LGBT demonstrators in Tbilisi, Georgia

Yesterday, a group of more than 1,000 people demonstrating against a planned LGBT Pride rally in Tbilisi, the capital, attacked dozens of journalists covering the event, as well as event organizers... demonstrators proceeded to attack at least 55 people, including 53 members of the press, according to a statement by the Georgian Interior Ministry, which said that police were investigating those attacks...


All three from CPJ, plus two more articles on the first story, which has been noticed by western media:

Crime reporter Peter de Vries fighting for life after Amsterdam shooting (Guardian)

Dutch crime reporter Peter de Vries, known for his work in exposing the criminal underworld, has been shot and seriously wounded on a street in Amsterdam. Three suspects were detained, including the possible gunmen, police said, without providing details. “He was seriously wounded and is fighting for his life,” Amsterdam’s mayor, Femke Halsema, said in a televised news conference. “He is a national hero to us all. A rare, courageous journalist who tirelessly sought justice.” De Vries was shot five times, including once in the head...


Peter R de Vries: Dutch crime journalist wounded in Amsterdam shooting (BBC)

A prominent Dutch crime journalist has been seriously wounded after being shot on a street in Amsterdam. Police said Peter R de Vries was taken to hospital in a serious condition after being gunned down in the city centre on Tuesday evening...In the past Mr de Vries has been given police protection after receiving threats for his involvement in criminal cases as an investigative journalist and in court...


129John5918
Bearbeitet: Jul. 8, 2021, 12:15 am

Imprisoned Belarusian journalist Andrei Aliaksandrau charged with treason (CPJ)

On June 30, authorities charged Aliaksandrau, founder and chief editor of the news website Belaruski Zhurnal, with treason, according to multiple news reports. If convicted, he could face up to 15 years imprisonment...


More reaction on the shooting of a Dutch journalist:

Peter R de Vries: Shooting of investigative reporter stuns Dutch (BBC)

Prime Minister Mark Rutte said the shooting was "shocking and incomprehensible", adding that it was an attack on a "courageous journalist" and on the freedom of the press. King Willem-Alexander and Queen Máxima said they were "deeply shocked" and that "journalists must be free to carry out their important work without threats"...


Peter R de Vries: The Dutch crime reporter who defied death threats (BBC)

For decades, Peter R de Vries has been the bane of the criminals in the Netherlands. The 64-year-old crime journalist has thrived off solving cold cases and investigating mob bosses without fear or favour, earning him plaudits and a glowing reputation. But that reputation has made him a target as well as a celebrity. For him, death threats have become routine. "I'm not scared," he told the Vrij Nederland magazine earlier this year. "That's part of the job." Now that job has apparently put him in the firing line...


‘An attack on us all’: European leaders condemn shooting of Dutch reporter (Guardian)

European leaders and press freedom campaigners have condemned the shooting of journalist Peter R de Vries on a busy Amsterdam street, demanding his attackers face justice as the veteran Dutch crime reporter fights for his life in hospital. “This is a crime against journalism and an attack on our values of democracy and rule of law,” the head of the European Council, Charles Michel, tweeted. “We will relentlessly continue to defend the freedom of the press”...


And one positive story:

Guardian journalist helped me see a way out, ex-cult member recalls (Guardian)

It was a simple question to a child, one routinely asked by adults: what do you want to be when you grow up? But for 11-year-old Bexy Cameron, who had never known anything but the strict religious cult she was born into, it was life-changing. Her brief encounter with the Guardian journalist Walter Schwarz in the 1990s led to her escaping the Children of God cult at the age of 15, leaving behind her parents and siblings. Now she has written a memoir, Cult Following, about growing up in a movement founded by a controlling sexual predator. The last line of her acknowledgments reads: “Eternal gratitude to Walter Schwarz (RIP). Who knows what would have happened without that ‘one simple question’?”...

130John5918
Jul. 9, 2021, 12:17 am

Assange fiancee rejects US proposals over possible extradition (Guardian)

US assurances that Julian Assange would not be held under the strictest maximum-security conditions if extradited from the UK have been rejected by his fiancee, who described them as a formula to keep him in prison for the rest of his life...


Belarusian authorities raid news outlets, detain journalists amid nationwide crackdown (CPJ)

Starting this morning, authorities raided at least three news outlets and arrested at least seven journalists nationwide amid a crackdown on the independent media... Belarusian authorities have repeatedly arrested, jailed, and harassed journalists since protests broke out nationwide last year following a contested August election in which longstanding leader Aleksandr Lukashenko claimed victory... “Today’s raids mark a significant escalation in Belarusian President Lukashenko’s war on the independent press”...

131margd
Jul. 9, 2021, 4:37 pm

TV news crews are increasingly threatened with violence on the job
Paul Farhi | July 9, 2021

In recent months, local TV news crews have faced verbal and physical abuse while on the job. A few reporters have been injured. Some have been robbed or had equipment damaged.

...Many people feel as if they have permission to be aggressive toward journalists

Station managers who responded to the industry survey said their journalists had been verbally harassed, punched, slapped, shoved, spat on, robbed at gunpoint, and hit with rocks and water bottles. At a rally for Trump, one attendee “deliberately coughed on our reporter”...

Some of the increased threat may be an upshot of the pandemic and the tensions created by lockdowns and economic disruption, (but) Bob Papper, an adjunct professor at Syracuse University’s Newhouse School of Communications who conducted the industry survey...blames some of it on the continuing demonization of the news media by Trump and his allies, including those in the conservative media. “It’s clear a lot of people are still angry, and they’re angry at the media...It’s the expected consequence of calling the media ‘the enemy of the people.’ ”...

https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/media/tv-news-crews-attacked/2021/07/08...

132John5918
Jul. 11, 2021, 1:36 pm

Georgian cameraman dies after attack by far-right, anti-LGBTQ mob (Guardian)

A Georgian TV cameraman has died after being badly beaten by far-right assailants during a protest against an LGBTQ Pride march, his station said on Sunday, as pressure mounts on authorities over attacks on journalists. Alexander Lashkarava, a 37-year-old cameraman working for the independent station TV Pirveli, was found dead in his bed in the early hours on Sunday, the channel reported. Last Monday he was assaulted by a violent mob of anti-LGBTQ protesters and sustained fractures to his facial bones. More than 50 journalists were attacked that day by anti-LGBTQ groups...

133John5918
Jul. 12, 2021, 10:11 am

Nazis, fear and violence: when reporting from Berlin was dangerous (Guardian)

Our Germany correspondent salutes the man who did his job 100 years ago, when it was far more perilous and unpredictable...

Within months of arriving in Germany, while covering the Ruhr miners’ uprising in Essen, he was kidnapped by rogue Reichswehr officers who accused him of being a spy, stood him against a wall and peppered the space around his head with bullets... His 1926 exclusive on a covert collaboration between the Reichswehr and the Soviet Red Army brought the German government to collapse. Other journalists would have known of the secret deal, which was common knowledge among European intelligence agencies, just as they would have known that making it public risked being sent to prison for treason in Germany. They decided not to publish. Voigt did. Most important of all, while living through and reporting on this tumultuous and disorientating decade in European history, Voigt managed to keep a steady eye on the most important story on his patch – the rise of nazism – realising soon it wasn’t one to which he could afford to give the “both sides” treatment...

134John5918
Bearbeitet: Jul. 14, 2021, 12:08 am

Mexican journalist Daniel Lizárraga expelled from El Salvador (CPJ)

On July 6, immigration authorities notified Lizárraga, a Mexican citizen and an editor for the independent Salvadoran news website El Faro, that his work permit had been denied “because he could not prove that he is a journalist”...


Iranians 'plotted to kidnap US, Canada and UK targets' (BBC)

Four Iranian nationals have been charged with plotting to kidnap a New York-based journalist, the US Department of Justice says. The indictment did not name the target, but Masih Alinejad, an Iranian-born author who lives in Brooklyn, says it was her... Prosecutors said the Iranian government had sought to lure the New York-based journalist to a third country where the abduction was planned...

135John5918
Jul. 14, 2021, 12:36 pm

Brazilian president’s lawyer sends threatening message to UOL journalist Juliana Dal Piva (CPJ)

On July 9, Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro’s personal lawyer Frederick Wassef sent a lengthy threatening text message, which CPJ reviewed, to Juliana Dal Piva, a journalist with the national online outlet UOL. In the message, Wassef asked if Dal Piva is a “communist” or a “soldier of the angry left,” and asked why she didn’t move to China, where “you would disappear and not even your body would be found.” Wassef also accused Dal Piva of “attacking and trying to destroy Brazil’s president, its family and its lawyer” and called her “an enemy of the homeland.” Dal Piva interviewed Wassef via phone on July 2 for a series of reports on alleged corruption involving the president and his family members; portions of Wassef’s interview were also included in a July 9 episode of Dal Piva’s UOL podcast “The secret life of Jair,” the journalist told CPJ in a phone interview. Wassef’s text message to the journalist did not reference a specific piece of reporting...

136John5918
Jul. 15, 2021, 12:02 am

Georgia TV stations protest over far-right attacks on journalists (Guardian)

Four independent TV stations in Georgia have suspended broadcasts for 24 hours as part of a wave of media protests against attacks on journalists by far-right mobs. More than 50 journalists were beaten last week, some with sticks, while covering a protest against a Tbilisi Pride parade, Ultraconservative politicians and priests urged on supporters who raided the offices of pro-LGBTQ groups...


Chilean police shoot 2 journalists with rubber bullets at activist’s funeral procession (CPJ)

On July 7, at about 6 p.m., agents with the Chilean Investigative Police shot rubber bullets at both journalists while they were covering the funeral procession of activist Luisa Toledo Sepúlveda as it passed in front of the Investigative Police headquarters in Santiago, the capital, hitting García in the face and Rojas in the foot...

137Earthling1
Jul. 15, 2021, 9:39 am

Dieses Mitglied wurde von der Website gesperrt.

138John5918
Bearbeitet: Jul. 15, 2021, 12:28 pm

>128 John5918:, >129 John5918:

Dutch journalist Peter R. de Vries has now died from injuries sustained during last week's shooting. RIP.

Dutch journalist Peter R. de Vries dies after shooting (CPJ)

Dutch crime reporter Peter de Vries dies after shooting (Guardian)

139Earthling1
Jul. 15, 2021, 1:07 pm

Dieses Mitglied wurde von der Website gesperrt.

140John5918
Jul. 16, 2021, 1:50 am

Russia bans media outlet that published Vladimir Putin scoops (Guardian)

The Kremlin’s war on independent journalism in Russia has escalated after the Proekt investigative media outlet was outlawed in an act of revenge for a series of deeply embarrassing revelations about Vladimir Putin and top Kremlin officials...


And three from CPJ today:

Belarus police continue newsroom raids, target journalists’ association

Early yesterday morning, Belarusian law enforcement officers raided the Minsk headquarters of the Belarusian Association of Journalists (BAJ), a local advocacy and trade organization...


CPJ welcomes jury ruling in US Capital Gazette murders

a jury in Anne Arundel County, Maryland, today ruled that the man who killed four Capital Gazette journalists and a media worker in 2018 is criminally responsible for his actions... “The murders of journalists must never go unpunished lest other would-be attackers become emboldened.”


Journalists detained and harassed, internet disrupted amid Cuban protests

Authorities have disrupted internet access in the country, and police have detained at least seven journalists...

141John5918
Bearbeitet: Jul. 17, 2021, 12:25 am

RFE/RL office raided, journalists detained as Belarus crackdown continues (CPJ)

Early this morning, security forces raided RFE/RL’s office in Minsk, where officers broke down doors, confiscated equipment, and sealed the office’s main entrance... Security officers also searched the homes of RFE/RL correspondent Valyantsin Zhdanko and former RFE/RL correspondents Aleh Hrudzilovich and Ina Studzinskaya, whose accreditations were cancelled by the authorities last year... Officers detained Hrudzilovich and Studzinskaya following the raids...


Danish Siddiqui: Indian photojournalist killed in Afghanistan (BBC)

Pulitzer Prize-winning Indian photojournalist Danish Siddiqui has been killed in Afghanistan, said the country's ambassador in Delhi. The 41-year-old, who was chief photographer for Reuters news agency in India, was on assignment when he died. He was embedded with a convoy of Afghan forces that was ambushed by Taliban militants near a key border post with Pakistan...

142John5918
Jul. 18, 2021, 7:52 am

Female Catholic Journalist in South Sudan Says “honored” on Receiving Excellence Award (ACI Africa)

A female journalist based at Emmanuel Radio of South Sudan’s Catholic Diocese of Torit has told ACI Africa she is “very honored” on receiving the Excellence in Journalism Award. Ibasi Patricia Tobs who is a news editor at the Diocesan radio station was declared the recipient of the July 8 Excellence in Journalism Award from the South Sudanese Women Intellectuals Forum the global non-profit platform that aims to realize a free, just, and equitable society...

“I am so interested in investigative journalism, as I move on with this award, in five years’ time, I will do much better than this. I have not done any investigative stories so far but I look forward to doing it,” she said...

143John5918
Bearbeitet: Jul. 18, 2021, 11:01 am

>139 Earthling1:

I thought long and hard about whether to respond to your dysfunctional post or whether to ignore it. It is not a personal insult against a LT member, so it is not flaggable, but it is an insult to the memory of a courageous professional, to the Dutch people who remember him with pride, and to journalists and indeed all decent people everywhere. I doubt whether my response will have any impact on you, except perhaps for you to produce another inane and offensive remark, but I write it anyway in honour of Peter de Vries and others.

Whatever your personal opinion of him in particular and journalists in general, he was a courageous individual going about his job in a professional manner. He has family, friends and loved ones who mourn him. To crow about the violent death of any human being is, I believe, despicable.

I'm tempted to ask, "Have you no shame?" but I think a review of your posts would answer that question. Perhaps a better question would be, "Have you no consistency?" If we look at who Peter de Vries actually was, we find he was a military veteran, and he was an active campaigner against organised crime, particularly the drugs trade. Both of these would be expected to endear him to the right wing. So you are basically approving the act of the criminal underworld for murdering a military veteran who was part of the "war on drugs" - it "made your day". Is this just you, or would you say it is a general opinion amongst the extreme right wing?

Did the death of Danish Siddiqui (>141 John5918:) also "make your day"? Killed while documenting the war in Afghanistan, a war which is of great interest and importance to your country and mine as our troops were fighting, killing and dying there. A war which our countries have just left in a bipartisan move, initiated by Republican President Trump and completed by Democrat President Biden and right wing Prime Minister Boris Johnson. Journalists played a major role in keeping our people, you and me, informed about what was going on there.

I don't know what you do for a living, but does your work expose you to daily danger, to death threats and murder, to beatings and torture, to arbitrary detention, to constant harassment just for doing your job? Not for doing your job badly, mind, but for doing your job well and professionally; the better a journalist is at their job, the more threats they often face,

And what would your advice be to the young South Sudanese woman journalist who has just received an award? (>142 John5918:). She lives and works in a country with a corrupt authoritarian government, where journalists, human rights activists and ordinary citizens are routinely detained, tortured and killed. I was in South Sudan last month where I heard first hand from some of her fellow journalists about the difficulties they face. She aspires to be an investigative journalist, to expose the wrongdoing and to help to bring peace, democracy and justice to her country. What do I hear you say to Ibasi Patricia Tobs? "You're the biggest fraud on the planet, your occupation is despicable, you are only one notch above a child molester"? (>137 Earthling1:)

144John5918
Jul. 18, 2021, 1:36 pm

Revealed: leak uncovers global abuse of cyber-surveillance weapon (Guardian)

Human rights activists, journalists and lawyers across the world have been targeted by authoritarian governments using hacking software sold by the Israeli surveillance company NSO Group, according to an investigation into a massive data leak. The investigation by the Guardian and 16 other media organisations suggests widespread and continuing abuse of NSO’s hacking spyware, Pegasus, which the company insists is only intended for use against criminals and terrorists. The leak contains a list of more than 50,000 phone numbers that, it is believed, have been identified as those of people of interest by clients of NSO since 2016...

The phone number of a freelance Mexican reporter, Cecilio Pineda Birto, was found in the list, apparently of interest to a Mexican client in the weeks leading up to his murder, when his killers were able to locate him at a car wash. His phone has never been found – so no forensic analysis has been possible to establish whether it was infected...

145John5918
Jul. 19, 2021, 12:35 am

>144 John5918: Two more stories from the Guardian:

FT editor among 180 journalists identified by clients of spyware firm

The editor of the Financial Times is one of more than 180 editors, investigative reporters and other journalists around the world who were selected as possible candidates for surveillance by government clients of the surveillance firm NSO Group... Roula Khalaf, who became the first female editor in the newspaper’s history last year, was selected as a potential target throughout 2018. Her number is included in a leaked list of mobile phone numbers selected for possible surveillance by clients of NSO, an Israeli firm that manufactures spyware and sells it to governments. Its principal product, Pegasus, is capable of compromising a phone, extracting all of the data stored on the device and activating its microphone to eavesdrop on conversations.

Other journalists who were selected as possible candidates for surveillance by NSO’s clients work for some of the world’s most prestigious media organisations. They include the Wall Street Journal, CNN, the New York Times, Al Jazeera, France 24, Radio Free Europe, Mediapart, El País, Associated Press, Le Monde, Bloomberg, Agence France-Presse, the Economist, Reuters and Voice of America...


Saudis behind NSO spyware attack on Jamal Khashoggi’s family, leak suggests

In the wake of the brutal murder of the journalist Jamal Khashoggi, the NSO Group emphatically denied that its government clients had used its hacking malware to target the journalist or his family... Now a joint investigation by the Guardian and other media, based on leaked data and forensic analysis of phones, has uncovered new evidence that the company’s spyware was used to try and monitor people close to Khashoggi both before and after his death...

146John5918
Jul. 20, 2021, 12:42 am

CPJ welcomes new US rules protecting journalists’ records (CPJ)

In response to news reports today that U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland issued new rules limiting federal prosecutors’ ability to obtain journalists’ phone and email records in government leak investigations, the Committee to Protect Journalists issued the following statement: “This is a welcome first step in lessening the chilling effect on investigative journalism at a time when the public is growing increasingly dependent on revelations by whistleblowers to learn what the government is doing in their name,” said CPJ Deputy Executive Director Robert Mahoney. “The new rules to limit Washington’s ability to infringe on journalists’ confidential relationships with sources should serve as an example in the U.S. and abroad.”

The new rules bar federal prosecutors from seizing journalists’ records in leak investigations, but make exceptions for situations with imminent risks, such as kidnappings, or if authorities suspect a journalist worked with a terrorist organization or agents of a foreign power...

147John5918
Bearbeitet: Jul. 20, 2021, 11:46 pm

Brazilian journalist Jackson Silva survives shooting (CPJ)

At about 9 p.m. on July 9, in the city of Moju in the northern state of Pará, two unidentified men hiding outside Silva’s home shot him multiple times and then fled the scene on a motorcycle... Silva’s wife and two children were also at the scene of the shooting, but were not injured... Silva survived the shooting and was brought to a hospital in Pará’s capital, Belém, where he underwent several surgeries... Silva had since left the hospital in stable condition...

148John5918
Jul. 22, 2021, 11:48 pm

Burner phones, fake sources and ‘evil twin’ attacks: journalism in the surveillance age (Guardian)

When I heard my number was on a leaked data list, I wasn’t surprised. Reporters have never been more vulnerable...

Counterintelligence in journalism used to be the domain of reporters digging into matters of national security or liaising with sensitive government whistleblowers; but increasingly those tactics are necessary across the board...

149John5918
Jul. 24, 2021, 12:57 am

Russia names Bellingcat reporting partner a ‘foreign agent’ (Guardian)

Russia has named a local partner of the Bellingcat investigative journalism collective as a “foreign agent” in an apparent act of revenge for helping reveal the Kremlin’s role in the Salisbury poisonings and assassination attempts by the security agencies. Russia’s justice ministry on Friday named the Insider, an investigative website, along with five journalists for other publications as “foreign agents”, a label that implied the news agencies and individual reporters were taking foreign money to influence Russian politics. The designation requires the outlets to label all their content and is said to scare off potential partners and advertisers. Organisations that are deemed as failing to comply with the law can be forced to shut...

150John5918
Bearbeitet: Jul. 25, 2021, 12:17 am

Who’ll defend our right to a free press? Not the ex-hack in No 10 (Guardian)

Boris Johnson is an ex-journalist who wants to send working journalists to prison. Boris Johnson is an opponent of the “nanny state” who will give the courts the ability to jail anyone who reveals the abuse of state power. Judge him by the standards that are meant to have guided his life, and you find that Boris Johnson is a monumental fraud. Yet no one contemplating the autocratic control his government is awarding itself has said that his transformation from celebrity journalist into secret policeman needs explaining. The one principle even his sternest critic would expect him to defend was a free press. Yet there he is threatening to censor and imprison like a part-time Putin...

In its consultation for legislation to “counter state threats”, the Home Office proposes to “modernise” the Official Secrets Act. Its measure is only modern in the sense that Putin’s Kremlin or the Chinese Communist party is modern. Johnson is showing his modernity by going with the flow of a world where states everywhere are treating accountability as treason...

151John5918
Jul. 27, 2021, 4:31 am

Saudi Arabia: Sudanese Media Personality Jailed for Critical Tweets (Human Rights Watch)

A Saudi court sentenced a Sudanese media personality and journalist to four years in prison on June 8, 2021, for “insulting the state’s institutions and symbols” and “negatively speaking about the kingdom’s policies” among other vague charges, Human Rights Watch said today. The sentence against Ahmad Ali Abdelkader, 31, is related to tweets and media interviews he shared to Twitter in which he discussed and expressed support for Sudan’s 2018-19 revolution and criticized Saudi actions in Sudan and Yemen...

152John5918
Jul. 28, 2021, 12:44 am

South Sudan Journalist in Bad Health After Two Weeks in Detention (VOA)

Family members of South Sudanese journalist Alfred Angasi Dominic say they are relieved the National Security Service released him from detention but are worried about his declining health. Security agents detained Dominic for more than two weeks after he allegedly declined to report news about recent presidential decrees on the South Sudan Broadcasting Corporation. Dominic, a news anchor at the government-owned broadcasting network, was arrested July 4 and released on Saturday. He was diagnosed with tuberculosis months ago...

153John5918
Jul. 28, 2021, 8:35 am

The Guardian ‘most widely used newspaper website and app for news’, according to Ofcom (Guardian)

The Guardian continues to be the UK’s most widely used newspaper website and app for news, according to the communications watchdog, which shows it has increased its audience share over the past year.

The research by Ofcom, based on audience surveys, found that 23% of consumers who used websites or apps for news turned to the Guardian for their updates, one percentage point higher than the Daily Mail’s online products, and a one-point increase on the previous year. The Guardian also beat newspaper rivals in audience share among professional (ABC1) workers, with 25% of the audience share, among 16- to 24-year-olds, with 31%, and among readers from ethnic minority groups, with 29%.

But the lion’s share of online audience continued to be won by the BBC, with 67% of news consumers saying they tuned into the broadcaster’s websites and apps...

154John5918
Bearbeitet: Jul. 28, 2021, 11:25 pm

Camila Acosta speaks from house arrest about covering Cuba’s historic protests (CPJ)

“I am not free, but at least I am out of the dungeons,” Camila Acosta told CPJ via messaging app after her release to house arrest on July 16 following a four-day detention for covering the recent protests in Cuba. Acosta, who is based in Havana, covered protests on July 11 for the Cuban independent digital outlet Cubanet on Facebook Live and for the Spanish daily ABC. The following day, she was detained by officers of the National Revolutionary Police (PNR) and sent to the 4th Station of the PNR, in Havana. At least other 10 journalists have been detained in the aftermath of the protests, and today at least one remains behind bars...


Video of crime reporter Peter R de Vries after he was shot linked to killers (Guardian)

Footage of the Dutch crime reporter Peter R de Vries taken shortly after he had been shot in the head in central Amsterdam is thought to have been filmed and posted on the internet by those involved in his murder. Investigators believe two men had been standing ready and waiting for De Vries before he was attacked as part of a plan to film his body and post the images on the internet in order to attract maximum publicity. Videos of bystanders coming to help the fatally injured journalist swiftly went viral before YouTube eventually removed them. “If you want maximum attention, you do this,” a police source told the Algemeen Dagblad newspaper. “Then you ensure that shocking videos immediately spread across the internet. It is suspected that the men were waiting there”...

155John5918
Jul. 29, 2021, 1:55 pm

Malta government bears responsibility for journalist’s murder, inquiry finds (Guardian)

An independent inquiry in Malta into the car bomb murder of the anti-corruption journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia has found the state had to bear responsibility after creating a “culture of impunity”...

The inquiry, conducted by one serving judge and two retired judges, found that a culture of impunity was created by the highest echelons of power within the government of the time. “The tentacles of impunity then spread to other regulatory bodies and the police, leading to a collapse in the rule of law,” said the panel’s report, which was published by the prime minister, Robert Abela. It said the state failed to recognise the real and immediate risks to Caruana Galizia’s life and failed to take reasonable steps to avoid them. It was clear, the inquiry board said, that the assassination was either intrinsically or directly linked to Caruana Galizia’s investigative work...

156margd
Jul. 30, 2021, 10:46 am

Chad Loder @chadloder | 1:00 AM · Jul 30, 2021:
NOW: A group of anti-vaxxers including Bryna Makowka, Nick Yaya, and Jason Lefkowitz,
surrounded and attacked journalist Vishal Singh, (@VPS_Reports),
who already had a broken hand.

Singh was taken to the hospital with a hematoma and possible concussion.

From Billionaire Paid Activist
0:21 (https://twitter.com/chadloder/status/1420972457406525442

157davidgn
Bearbeitet: Jul. 30, 2021, 8:50 pm

So it's come to this for Amb. Murray: he's turned himself in today for 8 months in jail.

https://rsf.org/en/news/uk-blogger-craig-murray-jailed-eight-months-over-jigsaw-...


“While journalists must ensure they adhere to court orders with regard to witness protection, Craig Murray’s prison sentence on charges related to his blogging is disproportionate and highly concerning. RSF emphasises that journalistic activity should not lead to prison sentences anywhere; imprisonment in connection with any journalistic activity should only ever be a measure of absolute last resort - if at all. It is certainly not what we would expect in a country committed to protecting media freedom and the safety of journalists. Murray should be released and alternative measures considered in lieu of his prison sentence,” said RSF’s Director of International Campaigns and UK Bureau Director Rebecca Vincent.

RSF echoes Scottish PEN’s concerns regarding the chilling effect this ruling will have on reporting and free expression, noting that Murray is “the first person to be imprisoned in Scotland for media contempt for over 70 years.”

The Craig Murray Justice Campaign has cautioned that legal precedent will be set, stating that Murray will be “the first person to be imprisoned on the charge of jigsaw identification in the UK, and indeed in the entire world.”

Former UK Ambassador to Uzbekistan, Murray is also known for his thorough coverage of Wikileaks publisher Julian Assange’s US extradition proceedings, which he wrote about in a blog series titled ‘Your Man in the Public Gallery’ on his website.


I seem to have missed today's protest (having had my own friend's emergency to contend with), and not sure about Sunday, but I was planning to make a trip to Inverness at some point in any case...

https://www.inverness-courier.co.uk/news/pictures-emergency-protest-organised-ou...

From Murray's camp:
https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2021/07/going-dark/


Going Dark 127
July 30, 2021 in Uncategorized by craig | View Comments
This blog will be going dark for a few months. The Queen kindly paid for my dinners for over twenty years while I was a British diplomat and Ambassador, and now she is going to be paying for my dinners again. That is very kind, I thought she had forgotten me.

The following is a statement from Nadira:

29.07.21
Today is the most heartbreaking day. My husband whose health has been found to not be suitable for prison must hand himself in for detention within hours following the UK Supreme Court’s decision not to hear his appeal.

We were extremely hopeful that the Supreme Court would hear his case and had no doubt that this particular case should have been heard given how important and relevant it is in the context of Freedom of Speech in the UK. Instead, the Supreme Court declined to hear it.

Yet again my heart is deeply saddened to find that the UK, once a country which placed great importance on Human Rights issues, has failed to listen to my husband’s case. Additionally, the Scottish Court outright dismissed Craig’s poor health, having been made aware through the mandatory Social Work report and doctor’s reports that his wellbeing would be at risk if forced to go to jail.

At first I tried to come to terms of him being jailed in the hope he would be granted dignified conditions in jail but I am saddened and shocked to learn he could be placed among criminals, with no ability to bring books or enable him to write, with no entertainment allowed. He is being treated like a criminal. This is not a just punishment, this is a deliberate attempt to break the spirit of anyone brave enough to make use of free speech.

Given a pen and paper what do you do? You write in your own voice speaking the truth. Having been with Craig for two decades he has always spent his time and energy highlighting injustices and standing up for what is right, carefully, considerately and consistently.

I was brought up during Soviet times, and post independence in my own country, Uzbekistan. I have witnessed and personally experienced myself what the price of freedom of speech truly is. Opponents were ‘disappeared’ or it was claimed they had ‘taken their own life’, or been locked away in asylums. I am filled with fear this pattern is now repeating itself in the UK. It is appalling to see Craig is going through the same treatment in the so-called ‘human rights’ respecting country UK.

This is an attack on Truthtellers. His writings are those of a highly qualified Journalist, Human Rights Activist, former Rector of Dundee University and former British Ambassador. To us, his family, this situation is devastating: I am now left with my 5 months old baby, yet to find a good way to explain Craig’s jail sentence to his confused and anxious 12 year old son.

Of any readers concerned with the loss of freedom of speech and equality before the law I ask that you show active and outspoken solidarity with my partner.


ETA: And an blasting of the case itself from another independent (ex-Guardian) journalist I respect, Jonathan Cook.

https://www.jonathan-cook.net/blog/2021-07-30/craig-murrays-jailing-is-the-lates...

...
Two-tier journalism
The most glaring, and disturbing, legal innovation in Lady Dorrian’s ruling against Murray – and the main reason he is heading to prison – is her decision to divide journalists into two classes: those who work for approved corporate media outlets, and those like Murray who are independent, often funded by readers rather than paid big salaries by billionaires or the state.

According to Lady Dorrian, licensed, corporate journalists are entitled to legal protections she denied to unofficial and independent journalists like Murray – the very journalists who are most likely to take on governments, criticise the legal system, and expose the hypocrisy and lies of the corporate media.

In finding Murray guilty of so-called “jigsaw identification”, Lady Dorrian did not make a distinction between what Murray wrote about the Salmond case and what approved, corporate journalists wrote.

That is for good reason. Two surveys have shown that most of those following the Salmond trial who believe they identified one or more of his accusers did so from the coverage of the corporate media, especially the BBC. Murray’s writings appear to have had very little impact on the identification of any of the accusers. Among named individual journalists, Dani Garavelli, who wrote about the trial for Scotland on Sunday and the London Review of Books, was cited 15 times more often by respondents than Murray as helping them to identify Salmond’s accusers.

Rather, Lady Dorrian’s distinction was between who gets protected when identification occurs. Write for the Times or the Guardian, or broadcast on the BBC, where the audience reach is enormous, and the courts will protect you from prosecution. Write about the same issues for a blog, and you risk being hounded into prison.

In fact, the legal basis of “jigsaw identification” – one could argue the whole point of it – is that it accrues dangerous powers to the state. It gives permission for the legal establishment to arbitrarily decide which piece of the supposed jigsaw is to be counted as identification. If the BBC’s Kirsty Wark includes a piece of the jigsaw, it does not count as identification in the eyes of the court. If Murray or another independent journalist offers a different piece of the jigsaw, it does count. The obvious ease with which this principle can be abused by the establishment to oppress and silence dissident journalists should not need underscoring.

And yet this is no longer Lady Dorrian’s ruling alone. In refusing to hear Murray’s appeal, the UK supreme court has offered its blessing to this same dangerous, two-tiered classification.

Credentialed by the state
What Lady Dorrian has done is to overturn traditional views of what constitutes journalism: that it is a practice that at its very best is designed to hold the powerful to account, and that anyone who engages in such work is doing journalism, whether or not they are typically thought of as a journalist.

That idea was obvious until quite recently. When social media took off, one of the gains trumpeted even by the corporate media was the emergence of a new kind of “citizen journalist”. At that stage, corporate media believed that these citizen journalists would become cheap fodder, providing on-the-ground, local stories they alone would have access to and that only the establishment media would be in a position to monetise. This was precisely the impetus for the Guardian’s Comment is Free section, which in its early incarnation allowed a varied selection of people with specialist knowledge or information to provide the paper with articles for free to increase the paper’s sales and advertising rates.

The establishment’s attitude to citizen journalists, and the Guardian’s to the Comment is Free model, only changed when these new journalists started to prove hard to control, and their work often highlighted inadvertently or otherwise the inadequacies, deceptions and double standards of the corporate media.

Now, Lady Dorrian has put the final nail in the coffin of citizen journalism. She has declared through her ruling that she and other judges will be the ones to decide who is considered a journalist and thereby who receives legal protections for their work. This is a barely concealed way for the state to license or “credentialise” journalists. It turns journalism into a professional guild with only official, corporate journalists safe from legal retribution by the state.

If you are an unapproved, uncredentialed journalist, you can be jailed, as Murray is being, on a similar legal basis to the imprisonment of someone who carries out a surgical operation without the necessary qualifications. But whereas the law against charlatan surgeons is there to protect the public, to stop unnecessary harm being inflicted on the sick, Lady Dorrian’s ruling will serve a very different purpose: to protect the state from the harm caused by the exposure of its secret or most malign practices by trouble-making, sceptical – and now largely independent – journalists.

Journalism is being corralled back into the exclusive control of the state and billionaire-owned corporations. It may not be surprising that corporate journalists, keen to hold on to their jobs, are consenting through their silence to this all-out assault on journalism and free speech. After all, this is a kind of protectionism – additional job security – for journalists employed by a corporate media that has no real intention to challenge the powerful.

But what is genuinely shocking is that this dangerous accretion of further power to the state and its allied corporate class is being backed implicitly by the journalists’ union, the NUJ. It has kept quiet over the many months of attacks on Murray and the widespread efforts to discredit him for his reporting. The NUJ has made no significant noise about Lady Dorrian’s creation of two classes of journalists – state-approved and unapproved – or about her jailing of Murray on these grounds.

But the NUJ has gone further. Its leaders have publicly washed their hands of Murray by excluding him from membership of the union, even while its officials have conceded that he should qualify. The NUJ has become as complicit in the hounding of a journalist as Murray’s fellow diplomats once were for his hounding as an ambassador. This is a truly shameful episode in the NUJ’s history.

Free speech criminalised
But more dangerous still, Lady Dorrian’s ruling is part of a pattern in which the political, judicial and media establishments have colluded to narrow the definition of what counts as journalism, to exclude anything beyond the pap that usually passes for journalism in the corporate media.

Murray has been one of the few journalists to report in detail the arguments made by Assange’s legal team in his extradition hearings. Noticeably in both the Assange and Murray cases, the presiding judge has limited the free speech protections traditionally afforded to journalism and has done so by restricting who qualifies as a journalist. Both cases have been frontal assaults on the ability of certain kinds of journalists – those who are free from corporate or state pressure – to cover important political stories, effectively criminalising independent journalism. And all this has been achieved by sleight of hand.

In Assange’s case, Judge Vanessa Baraitser largely assented to US claims that what the Wikileaks founder had done was espionage rather than journalism. The Obama administration had held off prosecuting Assange because it could not find a distinction in law between his legal right to publish evidence of US war crimes and the New York Times and the Guardian’s right to publish the same evidence, provided to them by Wikileaks. If the US administration prosecuted Assange, it would also need to prosecute the editors of those papers.

Donald Trump’s officials bypassed that problem by creating a distinction between “proper” journalists, employed by corporate outlets that oversee and control what is published, and “bogus” journalists, those independents not subject to such oversight and pressures.

Trump’s officials denied Assange the status of journalist and publisher and instead treated him as a spy who colluded with and assisted whistleblowers. That supposedly voided the free speech protections he constitutionally enjoyed. But, of course, the US case against Assange was patent nonsense. It is central to the work of investigative journalists to “collude” with and assist whistleblowers. And spies squirrel away the information provided to them by such whistleblowers, they do not publicise it to the world, as Assange did.

Notice the parallels with Murray’s case.

Judge Baraitser’s approach to Assange echoed the US one: that only approved, credentialed journalists enjoy the protection of the law from prosecution; only approved, credentialed journalists have the right to free speech (should they choose to exercise it in newsrooms beholden to state or corporate interests). Free speech and the protection of the law, Baraitser implied, no longer chiefly relate to the legality of what is said, but to the legal status of who says it.

A similar methodology has been adopted by Lady Dorrian in Murray’s case. She has denied him the status of a journalist, and instead classified him as some kind of “improper” journalist, or blogger. As with Assange, there is an implication that “improper” or “bogus” journalists are such an exceptional threat to society that they must be stripped of the normal legal protections of free speech.

“Jigsaw identification” – especially when allied to sexual assault allegations, involving women’s rights and playing into the wider, current obsession with identity politics – is the perfect vehicle for winning widespread consent for the criminalisation of the free speech of critical journalists.

Corporate media shackles
There is an even bigger picture that should be hard to miss for any honest journalist, corporate or otherwise. What Lady Dorrian and Judge Baraitser – and the establishment behind them – are trying to do is put the genie back in the bottle. They are trying to reverse a trend that over more than a decade has seen a small but growing number of journalists use new technology and social media to liberate themselves from the shackles of the corporate media and tell truths audiences were never supposed to hear.

Don’t believe me? Consider the case of Guardian and Observer journalist Ed Vulliamy. In his book Flat Earth News, Vulliamy’s colleague at the Guardian Nick Davies tells the story of how Roger Alton, editor of the Observer at the time of the Iraq war, and a credentialed, licensed journalist if ever there was one, sat on one of the biggest stories in the paper’s history for months on end.

In late 2002, Vulliamy, a veteran and much trusted reporter, persuaded Mel Goodman, a former senior CIA official who still had security clearance at the agency, to go on record that the CIA knew there were no WMD in Iraq – the pretext for an imminent and illegal invasion of that country. As many suspected, the US and British governments had been telling lies to justify a coming war of aggression against Iraq, and Vulliamy had a key source to prove it.

But Alton spiked this earth-shattering story and then refused to publish another six versions written by an increasingly exasperated Vulliamy over the next few months, as war loomed. Alton was determined to keep the story out of the news. Back in 2002 it only took a handful of editors – all of whom had risen through the ranks for their discretion, nuance and careful “judgment” – to make sure some kinds of news never reached their readers.

Social media has changed such calculations. Vulliamy’s story could not be quashed so easily today. It would leak out, precisely through a high-profile independent journalist like Assange or Murray. Which is why such figures are so critically important to a healthy and informed society – and why they, and a few others like them, are gradually being disappeared. The cost of allowing independent journalists to operate freely, the establishment has understood, is far too high.

First, all independent, unlicensed journalism was lumped in as “fake news”. With that as the background, social media corporations were able to collude with so-called legacy media corporations to algorithm independent journalists into oblivion. And now independent journalists are being educated about what fate is likely to befall them should they try to emulate Assange or Murray.

Asleep at the wheel
In fact, while corporate journalists have been asleep at the wheel, the British establishment has been preparing to widen the net to criminalise all journalism that seeks to seriously hold power to account. A recent government consultation document calling for a more draconian crackdown on what is being deceptively termed “onward disclosure” – code for journalism – has won the backing of Home Secretary Priti Patel. The document implicitly categorises journalism as little different from espionage and whistleblowing.

In the wake of the consultation paper, the Home Office has called on parliament to consider “increased maximum sentences” for offenders – that is, journalists – and ending the distinction “between espionage and the most serious unauthorised disclosures”. The government’s argument is that “onward disclosures” can create “far more serious damage” than espionage and so should be treated similarly. If accepted, any public interest defence – the traditional safeguard for journalists – will be muted.

Anyone who followed the Assange hearings last summer – which excludes most journalists in the corporate media – will notice strong echoes of the arguments made by the US for extraditing Assange, arguments conflating journalism with espionage that were largely accepted by Judge Baraitser.

None of this has come out of the blue. As the online technology publication The Register noted back in 2017, the Law Commission was at the time considering “proposals in the UK for a swingeing new Espionage Act that could jail journalists as spies”. It said such an act was being “developed in haste by legal advisers”.

It is quite extraordinary that two investigative journalists – one a long-term, former member of staff at the Guardian – managed to write an entire article in that paper this month on the government consultation paper and not mention Assange once. The warning signs have been there for the best part of a decade but corporate journalists have refused to notice them. Similarly, it is no coincidence that Murray’s plight has also not registered on the corporate media’s radar.

Assange and Murray are the canaries in the coal mine for the growing crackdown on investigative journalism and on efforts to hold executive power to account. There is, of course, ever less of that being done by the corporate media, which may explain why corporate outlets appear not only relaxed about the mounting political and legal climate against free speech and transparency but have been all but cheering it on.

In the Assange and Murray cases, the British state is carving out for itself a space to define what counts as legitimate, authorised journalism – and journalists are colluding in this dangerous development, if only through their silence. That collusion tells us a great deal about the mutual interests of the corporate political and legal establishments, on the one hand, and the corporate media establishment on the other.

Assange and Murray are not only telling us troubling truths we are not supposed to hear. The fact that they are being denied solidarity by those who are their colleagues, those who may be next in the firing line, tells us everything we need to know about the so-called mainstream media: that the role of corporate journalists is to serve establishment interests, not challenge them.

158John5918
Bearbeitet: Jul. 31, 2021, 12:43 am

Mexican journalist Ricardo López shot and killed in Sonora (CPJ)

López, the founder and editor of news website InfoGuaymas, was shot and killed in the late afternoon on July 22, his 47th birthday, by an unknown assailant using a .38 caliber handgun in a parking lot of a convenience store in the city of Guaymas, in the northern Mexican state of Sonora...


Thailand bans sharing of news that ‘causes public fear’ amid pandemic criticism (Guardian)

The Thai government has outlawed sharing news that “causes public fear”, even if such reports are true, as officials face mounting criticism over their handling of the pandemic. On Thursday, the government tightened an emergency decree imposed more than a year ago that initially targeted false news... The measures have been widely condemned by media groups and rights experts as attempts to shut down negative news reports and silence debate...

159davidgn
Aug. 4, 2021, 10:43 pm

https://scottishpen.org/scottish-pen-response-to-imprisonment-of-writer-craig-mu...
Scottish PEN response to imprisonment of writer Craig Murray
We join with writers and organisations around the world to express concern about the impending imprisonment of Scottish writer and blogger Craig Murray on a sentence of eight months.

August 4, 2021
On Friday 30th July 2021, a post was shared from the Scottish PEN Twitter account where we joined with writers and organisations around the world to express concern about the impending imprisonment of Scottish writer and blogger Craig Murray on a sentence of eight months. As of Sunday, 1st August, Murray is now imprisoned.

Not only is this event – the first imprisonment of a writer in Scotland in living memory – of direct relevance to the work of Scottish PEN, but the terms of the sentence also constitute a potentially significant development in Scots Law. As an organisation with core concern in human rights and the defence of writers, the Board of Scottish PEN feels it appropriate to respond. That Craig Murray has been imprisoned on a charge of ‘jigsaw identification’ may represent a precedent with implications for the freedoms of a diverse media and journalism in this country, and possibly beyond.

In a case this complex, with so many important nuances and implications, it is also necessary to detail our concerns:

We do not intend to question the integrity of the verdict nor seek to undermine the processes of the legal system. Our concern is the decision to imprison Mr Murray. While journalists must ensure they adhere to court orders with regard to witness protection, we echo Reporters Without Borders’ statement that imprisonment in connection with any journalistic activity “should only ever be a measure of absolute last resort, if at all.”
We fully acknowledge and support the right of those reporting sexual violence to anonymity, respect, and protection of the court. Further, we understand that there are implications for freedom of expression in a context where victims of violence do not feel safe to share their experiences, and continue to work with our staff, committees and members to respond to these themes. We are glad to make this important principle clear.
Identification of persons afforded anonymity by the courts is a serious matter. Scottish PEN wholeheartedly supports our courts protection of identity and privacy of witnesses and parties where necessary, particularly in cases concerning claims of sexual offences. That, however, does not negate our concern at the decision to imprison Mr Murray.

Writers and ordinary citizens active on social media could now be subject to the precedent set by this decision. That a writer and blogger becomes the first person in Scotland imprisoned for media contempt in living memory should give us serious pause, particularly as the court found no evidence any protected person was identified by his action.

The sentence also goes against the Scottish Government’s oft-repeated policy statements regarding ineffective short prison terms. Such a punitive sentence seems disproportionate and may lead to a chilling effect on the work of writers and journalists commenting on controversial cases, especially those with political implications.

For those reasons Scottish PEN joins human rights organisations, writers, and journalists around the world in expressing serious concern at the sentence passed on Mr Murray, and regret at the UK Supreme Court’s refusal to hear his appeal.

The Board of Scottish PEN

160John5918
Aug. 5, 2021, 12:21 am

UK media unite to urge visas for Afghan reporters at risk from Taliban (Guardian)

A coalition of British newspapers and broadcasters has appealed to the government to expand its refugee visa programme for Afghans, to include people who have worked for UK media over the past 20 years.

In an open letter to the prime minister and foreign secretary, more than 20 outlets outlined the vital need for a route to safety for reporters whose work with British media could put them at risk of Taliban reprisals. “There is an urgent need to act quickly, as the threat to their lives is already acute and worsening,” the letter said. “If left behind, those Afghan journalists and media employees who have played such a vital role informing the British public by working for British media will be left at the risk of persecution, of physical harm, incarceration, torture, or death.

US media came together to make a similar appeal last month, unifying outlets as diverse as Fox and the New York Times. The Biden administration has since expanded its visa programme for Afghanistan, to cover people with links to the US media, and US-funded aid projects. The signatories to the British letter represent an equally broad coalition...

161margd
Aug. 5, 2021, 4:11 pm

Scott Dworkin funder | 1:29 PM · Aug 5, 2021:
BREAKING: 4 police officers forcibly removed journalist Grant Stern for asking Kevin McCarthy a question—
why he opposed the bipartisan Jan 6th Commission.
This is outrageous and shouldn’t happen in America. This is what fascists do. Let’s make this viral.

0:55 ( https://twitter.com/funder/status/1423335351578419203 )
From
Grant Stern is fully vaccinated

162John5918
Aug. 6, 2021, 12:02 am

Former Capital Gazette editor on justice and healing after worst newsroom shooting in U.S. history (CPJ)

When CPJ interviewed Rick Hutzell at a café in Annapolis, Maryland, in July, he acknowledged that the decision to open up about his experiences as the former editor of the Capital Gazette, the site of the worst newsroom shooting in U.S. history, was a shift. Hutzell had been wary of giving interviews in the three years since a rogue shooter murdered five of his colleagues on June 28, 2018. The focus, he said, needed to be on the legal process and on the newsroom. But now, the legal process is close to wrapping up: on July 15, 2021, a jury deemed the shooter, Jarrod Ramos, criminally responsible for his actions – a decision that will likely lead Ramos to be sentenced to life in prison...

163John5918
Aug. 11, 2021, 12:43 am

‘Please pray for me’: female reporter being hunted by the Taliban tells her story (Guardian)

A young female journalist describes the panic and fear of being forced into hiding as cities across Afghanistan fall...


Mexican news anchor Azucena Uresti threatened in video by alleged gang leader (CPJ)

Uresti, one of Mexico’s best known news anchors who hosts programs on television broadcaster Milenio Televisión and radio broadcaster Radio Fórmula, was threatened yesterday by an unidentified man claiming to speak for the leader of one of Mexico’s most powerful drug trafficking cartels in a video widely circulated on social media, according to news reports. In the video, which CPJ reviewed, the man said he represents Nemesio Rubén Oseguera Cervantes, alias “El Mencho,” whom news reports allege is the leader of the Jalisco Nueva Generación Cartel (CJNG), in delivering a message threatening to kill Uresti over her reporting on ongoing violence allegedly involving CJNG in the Tierra Caliente region of the central Mexican state of Michoacán. “I assure you that wherever you are I will find you and I will make you eat your words even if they accuse me of femicide,” the speaker says on behalf of the alleged gang leader...


Kyrgyzstan parliament approves ‘false information’ bill (CPJ)

On July 28, the Jogorku Kengesh, the country’s parliament, approved the bill “On Protection from Inaccurate (False) Information” by a vote of 97 to 5, according to news reports and parliament’s website. The bill will go into effect if Japarov signs it, according to those reports. The bill, the text of which CPJ reviewed, allows anyone to demand that allegedly false or defamatory information about them posted online be taken down within 24 hours and for its publisher to issue a correction. If the content is not removed within that timeframe, the plaintiff may apply to have the website or social media account’s activity suspended until the content is removed. The bill does not stipulate how this process will be administered, leaving it to be defined by the Cabinet of Ministers, a decision-making body in the executive branch. The bill also requires website owners and social media account holders to publicly display their names, initials, and email addresses, and requires internet service providers and public internet access points such as internet cafes to catalog the identities of their users.

“Kyrgyzstan’s ‘false information’ legislation threatens to seriously undermine the country’s fragile press freedoms,” said CPJ Program Director Carlos Martínez de la Serna. “Kyrgyzstan already has civil defamation codes on its books to address issues raised by the legislation. President Sadyr Japarov should reject the legislation, and authorities should refrain from adding expansive but poorly defined new powers to unspecified state bodies that could easily be weaponized against journalists”...

164John5918
Aug. 11, 2021, 9:59 am

Julian Assange loses court battle to stop US expanding extradition appeal (Guardian)

The Wikileaks founder, Julian Assange, has lost a high court battle to prevent the US government expanding the grounds for its appeal against an earlier refusal to allow his extradition to face charges of espionage and hacking government computers. On Wednesday, judges said a report from Assange’s psychiatric expert that was submitted at the original hearing in January could form part of Washington’s full appeal in October...

165John5918
Aug. 13, 2021, 11:29 am

Belarusian journalist Syarhey Hardzievich jailed for insulting president, police (CPJ)

On August 2, the Ivanavskiy District Court in the country’s southwestern Brest region convicted Hardzievich, a correspondent with the independent regional news website Pershy Region, on charges of insulting Belarusian President Aleksandr Lukashenko and two police officers, as well as defaming one of those officers... The court sentenced Hardzievich to 18 months in prison and ordered him to pay damages of 2,000 rubles (US$793) to each of the police officers, according to those sources.

Hardzievich denied the charges and plans to appeal the sentence... the journalist told the court the case was fabricated in retaliation for his journalism, and that there had been a “presumption of guilt” against him...


US ‘deeply troubled’ by controversial Poland media bill (Guardian)

Washington has said it is “deeply troubled” by a controversial media bill in Poland that with its chaotic passage through parliament has raised questions over the ruling Law and Justice party’s (PiS) long-term prospects. The US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, said the bill, widely seen as targeting Poland’s largest independent TV station, TVN, whose news channel TVN24 has often been critical of the populist government, “threatens media freedoms”. Blinken said in a statement that a free and independent media was fundamental to the bilateral relationship between the two countries, warning that commercial investment could also be undermined by “Poland’s troubling legislation”...

166John5918
Bearbeitet: Aug. 14, 2021, 12:37 am

Turkish commentator Emre Erciş shot in leg in Istanbul (CPJ)

an unidentified attacker shot Erciş in his foot and leg while he was walking in Istanbul’s Fatih district with his daughter, according to news reports, which said his daughter was not injured in the attack. The attacker wore a helmet and approached Erciş on a motorcycle, fired one shot that scratched his left foot, and other that entered his right leg below the knee, breaking a bone in his leg, according to those reports. The journalist was hospitalized following the attack, those reports said, adding that the injuries were not life threatening. Police have opened an investigation, those news reports said. Erciş frequently supports the Turkish government and criticizes opposition groups...


BBC condemns ‘assault on media freedom’ as Russia expels reporter (Guardian)

Russia is to expel a senior BBC journalist in Moscow by refusing to extend her accreditation in a move the broadcaster has condemned as a “direct assault on media freedom”. Sarah Rainsford’s visa is due to expire at the end of August and will not be renewed. The state broadcaster Rossiya-24 first reported the decision on Thursday evening, calling it a response to alleged UK refusals or delays in issuing visas to Russian journalists...

167John5918
Aug. 14, 2021, 2:53 pm

Nicaraguan police raid opposition newspaper La Prensa (Guardian)

Nicaraguan police have raided the offices of the main opposition newspaper La Prensa. The national police said the raid on Friday was part of an investigation into “customs fraud and money laundering”, and the newspaper’s offices remained under police custody. The raid came a day after La Prensa suspended its print edition because the government’s customs office had withheld newsprint paper. La Prensa, founded in 1926, has been critical of the president, Daniel Ortega, who has recently arrested dozens of opposition figures. The regime often uses money laundering, tax and other accusations to raid non-governmental and civic groups it disagrees with...

168John5918
Aug. 18, 2021, 12:50 am

Female presenter interviews Taliban spokesman on Afghanistan television (Guardian)

On Tuesday an unprecedented discussion took place on an Afghanistan television channel: a female presenter interviewed a Taliban spokesperson about the group’s plans for the country, days after insurgents seized control of the capital, Kabul.

Beheshta Arghand’s discussion with the spokesperson Mawlawi Abdulhaq Hemad is being claimed by the rolling news channel TOLO News as the first time an Afghan woman has conducted an interview with a senior Taliban official inside the country’s borders.

“We said to them, look, a female is going to interview you,” said Saad Mohseni, the founder of TOLO News. “And they said fine. They could have easily have said screw you – they run the country, they can do whatever they want.”

TOLO News briefly sent its female reporters home on Sunday owing to fears for their safety. But two days later many have returned to work and are out reporting on the streets. At the moment it is “business as a usual” for the outlet, which operates a slick 24-hour television channel and an online presence that has consistently beaten western outlets to obtain footage showing the collapse of the previous regime...

169prosfilaes
Aug. 18, 2021, 1:14 am

170margd
Aug. 18, 2021, 7:16 am

>168 John5918: Fingers crossed!

171John5918
Aug. 19, 2021, 12:08 am

UK news media repeat call to evacuate Afghan journalists (Guardian)

British media organisations have again urged the government to evacuate Afghan journalists and translators who worked with UK media outlets, with many local staff fearing Taliban reprisals. Dozens of local reporters and producers associated with British organisations remain in Afghanistan after the fall of Kabul on Sunday. This month the foreign secretary, Dominic Raab, promised to consider relocating local journalists to the UK on an “exceptional basis” if there was evidence they were under imminent threat because of their involvement with Britain. However, sources in Kabul suggested that during the last week the UK government had not evacuated a single Afghan journalist linked to British media. By comparison, the US military has already begun flying local staff who worked for American news outlets such as the Washington Post out of the country...


172John5918
Aug. 20, 2021, 12:25 am

Mexican reporter Maria Teresa Montaño abducted, robbed, and threatened in Toluca (CPJ)

On the afternoon of August 13, three unidentified men abducted Montaño, a freelance investigative reporter, as she attempted to board a public bus in a suburb of Toluca, the capital of the state of Mexico, according to news reports and the journalist, who spoke to CPJ in a phone interview. The men held Montaño at gunpoint, blindfolded her, and brought her to several ATMs where they forced her to withdraw money; they then commandeered her car, drove to her residence, and stole her phone, laptop, voice recorder, tablet, and a box carrying personal documents and notebooks she used for her work, the journalist told CPJ. The men threatened to kill Montaño if she reported the crime, and then drove her to the outskirts of Toluca, where they left her and stole her car; they detained her for about three hours in total, she said...


Belarus authorities search homes of 6 current and former BelaPAN employees, 3 remain in detention (CPJ)

This morning, law enforcement officers in Minsk, the capital, searched the editorial offices of the independent Belarusian news agency as well as the homes of six of its current and former employees... Police detained five people, released two after they signed nondisclosure agreements, and are continuing to hold BelaPAN director and chief editor Iryna Leushyna, the agency’s former director Dzmitry Navazhilau, and accountant Katsyaryna Boeva at the Akrestsina Detention Facility in Minsk...

173John5918
Bearbeitet: Aug. 21, 2021, 1:57 am

Turkish journalist Aydın Taş found dead in Ankara (CPJ)

On August 8, police officers found Taş’ body at the Ankara office of the Crimean News Agency (QHA), a Turkish nationalist news agency where he worked as the Turkey director... Police entered the Crimean News Agency’s office after people close to Taş were unable to reach him, and found the journalist on the floor with a rope around his neck, according to those reports, which said that his death had been classified as a suicide. The two colleagues who spoke to CPJ said they did not believe Taş had killed himself, saying they believed he had not reason to do so. One of those colleagues said that Turkish police had not interviewed any Crimean News Agency employees about the journalist’s death...


Reporter killed in Veracruz – the fifth murder of a journalist in Mexico this year (Guardian)

Jacinto Romero Flores had received threats after he reported on allegations of abuses by Veracruz police...


And a positive story:

SOUTH SUDAN: Catholic Radio Network wins 2021 Peace award (AMECEA)

Catholic Radio Network (CRN) has on 12 August 2021 been announced by Pax Christi International as the winner 2021 Peace prize. The director for Catholic Radio Network Mary Ajith congratulated all the staff of CRN for the hard work they have done which has made the network to win the award. She urged the staff of the Network to keep the spirit of commitment, team work for the betterment of the society. “We are happy to inform you that the Catholic Radio Network has been chosen to receive the 2021 Pax Christi International peace prize.

Pax Christi International (www.paxchristi.net) is the international Catholic peace movement founded in 1945 to promote reconciliation in Europe after World War II, its mandate has expanded to include advocacy for peace and justice on many levels, defence of human rights and care for creation, and promotion of nonviolence in all its aspects. Since 1988, the International peace prize has been awarded to an organisation or individual whose work, generally at the grassroots level, promotes justice and peace through nonviolent strategies...

The Catholic Radio Network was set up in 2006 by the Comboni Missionary Institutes and Sudan Catholic Bishops Conference. So far the Catholic Radio Network has won awards in different activities including the peace award which has been announced by Pax Christi International early this month. Catholic Radio Network is one of the powerful networks in South Sudan which covered the whole Country and broadcasting in different languages for the communities at the grassroots to understand what is happening in their Country...

174margd
Aug. 21, 2021, 8:05 am

Reporter Gets Death Threats After DeSantis Press Sec. Tweets Attacks Against Him
Chris Walker | August 18, 2021

A journalist said he faced death threats after Christina Pushaw, press secretary to Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R), responded to an article by him saying she would put him “on blast” unless he changed its content and headline to her liking.

Brendan Farrington, who writes for The Associated Press, detailed in an article published this week how DeSantis has been traveling around Florida touting a monoclonal antibody treatment, created by a company called Regeneron Pharmaceutical Inc., following huge increases in the levels of coronavirus cases and hospitalizations across the state. The treatment is deemed an effective way to treat individuals who have been diagnosed with COVID, reducing hospitalizations and deaths by a rate of around 70 percent.

Farrington noted in his article that DeSantis — who is adamantly anti-mask (so much so that he has products on his campaign site demonstrating his animus toward them) and who has also significantly downplayed the effectiveness of vaccines (which have reduced hospitalizations and deaths by about 95 percent) — has benefited from the political contributions of a hedge fund executive whose company has invested nearly $16 million in Regeneron. Ken Griffin, who is the CEO of a Chicago-based hedge fund called Citadel, has given more than $10 million over the past three years to a political committee that supports DeSantis, Farrington wrote...

https://truthout.org/articles/reporter-gets-death-threats-after-desantis-press-s...

175John5918
Aug. 22, 2021, 12:23 am

Dorothy Butler Gilliam: 'I am not a maid, I am a reporter' (BBC)

Dorothy Butler Gilliam began her career as a black female journalist on a major US newspaper at a time when society was still largely segregated. The BBC's Farhana Haider asked her how being a black woman in a white man's world had shaped her career.

When Dorothy Butler Gilliam arrived at a wealthy Washington woman's 100th birthday party the doorman told her she couldn't enter via the front door. "The maid's entrance is around the back," he explained. "I am not a maid, I am a reporter for the Washington Post," she replied.

Dorothy was the first African American woman to report for the newspaper. She started there in 1961, and went on to work as an editor and columnist over the next three decades, witnessing seismic changes in US society, and in the media...

176John5918
Aug. 23, 2021, 12:11 am

Afghan journalists win right to come to Britain after media appeal (Guardian)

More than 200 Afghan journalists who worked with the British media are to be granted access to the UK after an appeal by a coalition of British newspapers and broadcasters. Dominic Raab, the foreign secretary, has agreed to issue visa waivers for the group after officials said the government recognised the risks they took in pursuit of media freedom and the defence of human rights through their work. The group will now be given leave to enter the UK outside immigration rules, handing them the chance to settle in Britain...

177John5918
Aug. 28, 2021, 12:20 am

Vladimir Putin urged to end crackdown on Russian journalists (Guardian)

Russia’s leading independent media have appealed to Vladimir Putin and other top government officials to halt a crackdown on journalists under which some of the countries’ top outlets have been declared foreign agents or banned outright over the last year. More than a dozen media, including Meduza, TV Rain and Novaya Gazeta have signed an open letter to the government calling on it to remove individual journalists and their outlets from its blacklists and repeal laws on “foreign agents” and “undesirable organisations” altogether. “We are convinced that these events are part of a coordinated campaign to destroy independent Russian media, whose entire ‘guilt’ is constituted by their honestly fulfilling their professional duties to their readers,” the letter reads. “We demand that this campaign be halted right now”...

178John5918
Aug. 28, 2021, 2:47 am

Three Journalists Held, Radio Station Shut In South Sudan (AFP)

Security officials briefly detained three journalists in South Sudan and shut down their radio station Friday in connection with a demonstration planned by activists next week, a rights group and a media union said...


South Sudanese Journalist demands apology from VP's office for assault

A journalist working with Classic FM radio station in Juba, South Sudan is demanding an apology from the office of the Vice President for Gender and Youth Cluster Rebecca Nyandeng De Mabior after one of her bodyguards allegedly slapped him. Denis Logonyi told Radio Tamazuj that he was slapped on Wednesday at Nyakuron Cultural Centre while he was covering the inspection of South Sudanese products by Vice President Nyandeng during the commemoration of the International Youth Day...


Jonglei: NSS shuts down Radio Jonglei FM, briefly detains 3 journalists (Radio Tamazuj)

Radio Jonglei 95.9 FM, a community radio station in the Jonglei State capital, Bor town, has been shut down by the National Security Service (NSS) operatives and three journalists including the station's manager were briefly detained this afternoon. Tensions are growing in South Sudan as civil society activists called people to the streets in an anti-government demonstration on Monday next week...

179John5918
Aug. 31, 2021, 12:12 am

Nicaraguan authorities charge journalist Carlos Fernando Chamorro with financial crimes (CPJ)

On August 24, the Nicaraguan attorney general’s office published an official statement announcing criminal charges against Chamorro, the director of the Nicaraguan news website Confidencial, for alleged money laundering, property and asset laundering, misappropriation and improper withholding, and abusive management... Chamorro, who has been in exile in Costa Rica since June, said on a live broadcast on Confidencial’s YouTube page on August 25 that he viewed the charges as “attempting to silence a journalist, to kill press freedom and freedom of expression.” Chamorro also announced yesterday that Confidencial would stop broadcasting a weekly news program that had aired on Nicaraguan radio station Radio Corporación since February, citing pressure from the authorities and the new criminal charges...


Here's Donald Trump's most lasting, damaging legacy (CNN)

Donald Trump has held very few consistent positions since he began running for president in 2015. The one that stands out? His relentless bashing of the media as "fake news" and insistence that Republicans tune out all forms of mainstream media... A new Pew Research Center analysis shows that the number of Republicans who say they have "a lot" or "some" trust in national news organizations has been sliced in half over the last five years. In 2016, 70% of self-identified Republicans said they had at least some trust in national news organizations. That number is now 35%. And in 2020, trust in the national news media fell off a cliff. Almost half (49%) said they had a lot or some trust in the mainstream media in late 2019. That marks a 14-point drop on the question in less than two years...

He wanted to be the sole disseminator of information -- and "facts" -- to his base. That desire was driven by selfish and political concerns: Trump wanted to create an alternate reality in which he was winning at everything from the economy to immigration to even Covid-19. That such a concerted effort would have disastrous and even deadly consequences -- witness the number of unvaccinated Americans unnecessarily dying from Covid-19 -- didn't concern Trump. Vilifying the media, he believed, was a means to his desired end: winning reelection and/or burnishing his political (and personal) brand among the hardcore Trumpist base. The Point: When history books are written about the legacy Trump left behind after his turbulent four years in office, his assault on truth -- and the role a nonpartisan media plays in society -- will be its defining trait.


180John5918
Sept. 1, 2021, 9:28 am

Sudanese Journalists Network: harassment of journalists as frequent as during Al Bashir era (Radio Dabanga)

The Sudanese Journalists Network publicly condemned “the brutal attack on journalist Mohamed El Mustafa by regular armed forces on Saturday” in a statement yesterday. It called on the journalist community to take a stance against repression by regular armed forces... The network also condemned the persistent ill-treatment of journalist Tarig Osman... Last week, military intelligence personnel brutally assaulted journalist Ali El Dali...

On World Press Freedom Day in May this year, the Sudanese Journalists Union (SJU) criticised the fact that the National Press and Publications Council, “a repressive institution established by the defunct regime”, is still operating. Newspapers in Sudan still operate under the repressive 2009 law, which enables strict state control over the press and journalism with licensing powers, approval powers, heavy fines, and criminal sanctions for media outlets and journalists, and which the SJU called an obstacle to revolutionary journalism that “the former regime put in place to protect itself” and to “silence mouths and deny press freedom”. In January, the Military Intelligence banned journalists from entering Darfur...

181John5918
Sept. 2, 2021, 1:05 am

Peruvian journalist Carlos Yofré López convicted in one criminal defamation case, on trial in another (CPJ)

Both cases allege criminal defamation due to the journalist’s investigative work. In one case, López, a reporter for the independent Radio Antena 9 and Facebook-based news website Barranca Noticias in the Pacific coast province of Huaura, is being sued for criminal defamation by Juana Caballero, an appeals court judge in Huaura, according to his lawyer Eva Gomera who spoke to CPJ via messaging app. The suit was filed in 2018 but had its first hearing on August 12 after numerous delays... In a separate case, López was convicted of criminal defamation on August 5 on the basis of a complaint by Victor Reyes, the former president of Huaura’s superior court of justice. López was sentenced to a two-year suspended prison term and ordered to pay Reyes 50,000 soles (US$12,500) in damages...


Female TV anchor who interviewed Taliban official ends up having to flee Afghanistan (Guardian)

The Afghan television anchor Beheshta Arghand, who interviewed a Taliban official live on air after the fall of Kabul, has since fled to Qatar and told how the militants are pushing women out of journalism...


Afghanistan: fewer than 100 out of 700 female journalists still working (Guardian)

Female journalists in Afghanistan are being forced out of jobs and told to stay at home despite Taliban promises to allow them to keep working and to respect press freedom, according to a report. Reporters Sans Frontières (RSF) says it believes fewer than 100 of Kabul’s 700 female journalists are still working and only a handful are continuing to work from home in two other Afghan provinces. Others have been attacked and harassed...


182John5918
Sept. 3, 2021, 12:25 am

UK going backwards on tackling media’s racism, warns new Voice editor (Guardian)

The new editor of Britain’s only black national newspaper has warned the UK is going backwards in recognising institutional racism in the media and wider society...

183John5918
Sept. 4, 2021, 12:23 am

Vice tightens on South Sudan’s journalists (Reporters without Borders)

Reporters Without Borders (RSF) condemns an increase in the harassment of journalists and media outlets in South Sudan, amid civil society calls for the resignation of President Salva Kiir and Vice-President Riek Machar. The targets include Radio Jonglei, which has not broadcast since 27 August, when security officials raided the station, closed it down, briefly detained three of his journalists – Matuor Mabior Anyang, Ayuen Garang Kur and Deng Gai Deng – and confiscated their mobile phones... The raid on Radio Jonglei is the latest in a series of reprisals against journalists since the start of July, when Alfred Angasi, a news presenter with the state-owned South Sudan Broadcasting Corporation (SSBC), was arrested and held arbitrarily for more than two weeks for refusing to read part of a presidential decree during a news programme. Al Jazeera reporter Ajou Luol was briefly detained as a result of an argument with security agents when President Kiir gave a speech at the opening of parliament on 30 August. Two other journalists who were present at the time, Maura Ajak and Yom Manas, were threatened and roughed up, and their equipment was seized, when they tried to boycott the session in protest against Luol’s detention...

184John5918
Sept. 10, 2021, 12:19 am

Violent attacks on Afghan journalists by Taliban prompt growing alarm (Guardian)

As images circulate of the brutal flogging of two reporters, a senior Afghan journalist declares ‘press freedom has ended’...

185John5918
Sept. 11, 2021, 1:56 am

Ecuadorian journalist Virginia Suárez receives death threats (CPJ)

Suárez, who covers politics in the central town of Ventanas for her twice-weekly live news program called “Tus noches con Virginia” (Your nights with Virginia) on the Facebook-based news outlet Digital Vir’s, told CPJ via messaging app that she received a threatening message on August 24 on the outlet’s Facebook page as she was reporting from a local cemetery. She said she was interviewing residents about their complaints about an effort by town officials to expropriate land to expand the cemetery when a commenter wrote, “You probably want to be found in the cemetery as well, with your mouth open and full of flies.” She told CPJ that her colleagues at Digital Vir’s saw the message and told her about it after the commentator quickly deleted it...

186John5918
Sept. 18, 2021, 12:35 am

How Māori women have reshaped New Zealand’s media through their native language (Guardian)

Dunlop is the first Māori presenter on New Zealand’s national radio broadcaster to host a regular weekday news programme. In te reo Māori, Dunlop greets her listeners, gives the day of the week and what is coming up on the show, and will often korero Māori (speak Māori) to interviewees. Importantly, she is a fierce advocate for including more Māori experts, perspectives and stories in the programme, no matter the subject...

187John5918
Sept. 22, 2021, 9:57 am

Zahra Joya: the Afghan reporter who fled the Taliban – and kept telling the truth about women (Guardian)

As a child in Afghanistan, she pretended to be a boy in order to get an education, before starting her own women’s news agency. Now living in Britain, her fight continues...

188John5918
Bearbeitet: Okt. 2, 2021, 1:22 am

Colombian journalist Marcos Efraín Montalvo shot and killed

On September 19, in the western city of Tuluá, an unidentified man with a pistol entered a store where Montalvo was talking with a friend and fatally shot the journalist four times in the chest, according to news reports and security footage of the shooting. The gunman did not rob the store and immediately fled on a motorcycle, according to those reports. Montalvo, 68, had reported since the 1970s for local newspapers and radio stations and for the El País newspaper in the nearby city of Cali; in recent years he published nearly all of his reporting on his personal Facebook page...


Mexican journalist Manuel González Reyes shot dead in Cuernavaca

At about 4:30 p.m. on September 28, unidentified attackers shot and killed González, founder and editor of the Facebook-based news outlet Portal Morelos Noticias, in Cuernavaca, the capital of the central Mexican state of Morelos... Citing eyewitnesses, the Mexico City newspaper El Universal reported that two men drove up to González on a motorcycle after he had eaten at a food stand in the Miraval neighborhood of Cuernavaca, and shot him with pistols. A report by the Morelos state prosecutor’s office, which CPJ reviewed, stated that authorities did not know the number of people involved in the attack or any of their identities. That report said González was shot multiple times and died at the scene...


São Paulo police arrest Brazilian sports blogger Paulo Cezar de Andrade Prado in defamation case

Yesterday morning, São Paulo state civil police officers arrested Prado, who covers sports and politics on his blog Blog do Paulinho, at his home, according to news reports, a video summarizing the case that Prado recorded before his arrest, and his lawyer, Daniel Casagrande, who spoke to CPJ via messaging app. Casagrande told CPJ that the police were acting on the open arrest order issued by the 26th Criminal Court of São Paulo state on February 23 to enforce a five-month prison sentence for Prado, in relation to a criminal defamation case that has been ongoing since 2016, as CPJ documented at the time...


All from CPJ. Plus:

CIA officials under Trump discussed assassinating Julian Assange (Guardian)

Senior CIA officials during the Trump administration discussed abducting and even assassinating WikiLeaks founder, Julian Assange, according to a US report citing former officials.

The discussions on kidnapping or killing Assange took place in 2017, Yahoo News reported, when the fugitive Australian activist was entering his fifth year sheltering in the Ecuadorian embassy. The then CIA director, Mike Pompeo, and his top officials were furious about WikiLeaks’ publication of “Vault 7”, a set of CIA hacking tools, a breach which the agency deemed to be the biggest data loss in its history. Pompeo and the CIA leadership “were completely detached from reality because they were so embarrassed about Vault 7”, Yahoo cites a former Trump national security official as saying. “They were seeing blood.” Some senior officials inside the CIA and the Trump administration went as far as to request “sketches” or “options” for killing Assange. “There seemed to be no boundaries,” a former senior counterterrorist official was quoted as saying. The CIA declined to comment...


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Okt. 8, 2021, 10:32 am

CPJ congratulates Maria Ressa and Dmitry Muratov for winning the 2021 Nobel Peace Prize (CPJ)

The Committee to Protect Journalists congratulates journalists Maria Ressa and Dmitry Muratov, who were awarded this year’s Nobel Peace Prize today. Their award comes at a time of unprecedented attacks on journalists in the form of sweeping crackdowns, digital surveillance, and an erosion of public trust in journalism.

“Dmitry Muratov and Maria Ressa personify the values of press freedom and the reason it matters. These are journalists under personal threat, who continuously defy censorship and repression to report the news, and have led the way for others to do the same,” said CPJ Executive Director Joel Simon. “This Nobel Peace Prize is a powerful recognition of their tireless work, and that of journalists all around the world. Their struggle is our struggle.”

In a statement, the Norwegian Nobel Committee said it was honoring Maria Ressa and Dmitry Muratov for their efforts to safeguard freedom of expression, and as symbolic of journalists globally fighting to protect press freedom...

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Dmitry Muratov: the Nobel winner shining light on Russia journalist murders

Co-laureate and editor of Novaya Gazeta has promised to use award to support press freedom...


Russia labels investigative news outlet Bellingcat a ‘foreign agent’

Russia has designated the Bellingcat investigative news outlet a “foreign agent” along with nine journalists and three media organisations — hours after a Russian journalist won the 2021 Nobel peace prize. The designations, which targeted one employee of the BBC’s Russian service, are the latest twist in a crackdown on media outlets that the authorities in Moscow see as hostile and foreign-backed...


Saudi aide accused of directing Khashoggi murder edges back to power

Three years after the assassination of Jamal Khashoggi, the Saudi royal court adviser accused of directing the murder is being quietly reintroduced by pro-government influencers as a patriotic figure who has served his country well...


All from the Guardian.

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Bearbeitet: Okt. 11, 2021, 2:49 am

Singapore’s new ‘foreign interference’ law leaves journalists like me with an impossible puzzle (Guardian)

The Singapore government is now free to act on suspicions of foreign influence, and their targets will struggle to clear their names...


Expelled: Russia, repression and me (BBC)

The BBC's Moscow correspondent, Sarah Rainsford, was recently expelled from Russia, a country she first began visiting in her teens as a student and has reported on since the start of Vladimir Putin's presidency. Now she's been barred for life, declared a 'security threat'. The move comes during an unprecedented assault on rights and freedoms in Russia, where critics of the Kremlin are increasingly being labelled as hostile 'agents' of the West.


Nobel Peace Prize 'for Russian journalists who lost their lives' (BBC)

Russian journalist Dmitry Muratov has told the BBC he is dedicating the Nobel Peace Prize, which he was awarded jointly with Filipino journalist Maria Ressa, to Russian journalists who have been killed in the line of duty. In an interview with the BBC's Richard Galpin, Dmitry Muratov described the situation with independent media in Russia as "very, very difficult and complicated" and criticised legislation which he said was "aimed at restricting the freedom of the press". In the last few months, dozens of Russian journalists and media outlets have been harassed and put on government blacklists as "foreign agents" or "undesirable organisations".


‘Very happy’: Duterte congratulates Maria Ressa on Nobel Prize (Al Jazeera)

The office of Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte has congratulated Filipino journalist Maria Ressa on being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, three days after the committee named her the winner alongside Russian journalist Dmitry Muratov... The award is a “victory for a Filipina and we are very happy for that,” presidential spokesperson Harry Roque told a regular news conference in the first comment on Ressa’s win by the president and his supporters...

Ressa, an award-winning journalist who co-founded the website Rappler, has focused much of her work on Duterte’s controversial war on drugs... Ressa, herself, faces multiple legal challenges related to Rappler’s reporting of Duterte’s government, including its use of social media to target opponents...

Ressa told Al Jazeera she was “shocked” when she learned she had been named the Peace Prize laureate, but said it was recognition of how crucial the battle for truth had become. “The algorithm of the world’s largest distributor of news – Facebook – actually favours lies laced with anger and hate that spreads faster than facts,” she said. “When facts are debatable, then you don’t have facts, you don’t have truth and you can’t have trust. Without all of these things then you don’t have a shared reality, you can’t have democracy and you certainly can’t have any meaningful human engagement to deal with (the) existential problems we face.”

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Okt. 13, 2021, 4:51 am

‘Hard choices’ for Singapore media after controversial law passed (Al Jazeera)

Singapore’s government says its new foreign interference law is needed to prevent outside meddling in the city state’s domestic affairs. But independent news outlets and observers worry that the broadly-worded Foreign Interference Countermeasures Act (FICA) will further limit freedoms in the tightly-controlled country of 5.5 million people...

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Facebook rule protects journalists and activists as ‘involuntary’ public figures (Guardian)

Facebook will count activists and journalists as “involuntary” public figures and increase protections against harassment and bullying targeted at these groups, its global safety chief said in an interview this week. The social media company, which allows more critical commentary of public figures than of private individuals, is changing its approach on the harassment of journalists and “human rights defenders”, who it says are in the public eye due to their work rather than their public personas...


How to expose corruption, vice and incompetence – by those who have (Guardian)

Investigative journalism is costly, time-consuming, risky and difficult, and sometimes results in legal threats, personal abuse to our journalists – or no publishable story at all. So why do we do it? Six of our investigative journalists answer questions from editor Mark Rice-Oxley...

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Okt. 19, 2021, 12:28 am

Breitbart reporter Gerry Aranda found dead in Mexico (CPJ)

On October 4, Aranda’s body was found in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of the southern state of Chiapas, according to news reports. A dual U.S. and Mexican citizen, Aranda was a reporter for the conservative U.S. news website Breitbart, which reported that local authorities believed he drowned while swimming. In an October 13 statement, however, the Chiapas state prosecutor’s office said that it was implementing “homicide protocols” in its investigation of Aranda’s death, a set of investigative policies used by state authorities to determine whether foul play was involved in a death...

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Inter-American Court of Human Rights finds Colombia responsible in Jineth Bedoya case (CPJ)

The Committee to Protect Journalists welcomed today’s announcement by the Inter-American Court of Human Rights that it ruled the Colombian state responsible for the abduction, rape, and torture of journalist Jineth Bedoya Lima in 2000 and ordered the Colombian government to investigate, prosecute, and punish those responsible and protect female journalists through investing in public programs to support them, among other measures.

“The Inter-American Court’s ruling is a historic acknowledgment of the deadly dangers that Colombia’s female journalists face and a recognition of Jineth Bedoya’s brave, tireless quest for justice,” said CPJ Latin America and the Caribbean Program Coordinator Natalie Southwick. “The Colombian government has for years refused to acknowledge or make amends for its responsibility in this case. It is past time for authorities to follow the steps laid out by the court to provide reparations to Bedoya and work to make Colombia a less dangerous place for women journalists.”

On May 25, 2000, Bedoya, then a reporter for daily El Espectador, was abducted outside a Bogotá prison where she was set to interview a member of a paramilitary group, and driven to another city, where she was beaten and raped, according to the Colombian attorney general’s office. Colombian courts have sentenced three of her attackers, all paramilitary fighters at the time of the attack, to prison, as CPJ has documented. The court also asked prosecutors to look into the involvement of other higher-ranking officials...


Colombia found responsible for 2000 kidnap and torture of journalist (Guardian)

The Colombian state has been found responsible for the kidnap, torture and rape of a prominent journalist who was abducted while reporting on her country’s civil war, in a landmark ruling from the inter-American court of human rights. Jineth Bedoya, who has been pursuing justice for over 21 years and now campaigns against sexual violence, was recognised by the court on Monday as having suffered “grave verbal, physical and sexual aggressions” for which the state was responsible. Before now, only three of her attackers had faced justice, receiving sentences in Colombian courts in 2019...

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Okt. 20, 2021, 8:08 am

I get abuse and threats online - why can't it be stopped? (BBC)

I'm the BBC's first specialist disinformation reporter - and I receive abusive messages on social media daily. Most are too offensive to share unedited. The trigger? My coverage of the impact of online conspiracies and fake news. I expect to be challenged and criticised - but misogynistic hate directed at me has become a very regular occurrence. Messages are laden with slurs based on gender, and references to rape, beheading and sexual acts. Some are a mish-mash of conspiracy theories - that I'm "Zionist-controlled", that I, myself, am responsible for raping babies. The C-word and F-word are repeatedly used... I wanted to understand why this is happening, the threat it poses - and why social media sites, the police and the government aren't doing more about it. So, I set out to make a film for the BBC's Panorama programme...

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Okt. 21, 2021, 12:09 am

Venezuelan authorities issue arrest warrant for journalist Roberto Deniz, raid family home

On October 14, a criminal court in the capital of Caracas issued an arrest warrant for Deniz, editor at digital investigative reporting outlet Armando.Info who is in exile in Colombia, according to his lawyer Ana Bejarano who spoke with CPJ via messaging app and shared a copy of the warrant with CPJ. The warrant says that Deniz is under criminal investigation under the Anti-Hate Law for “inciting hate,” a charge that carries up to 20 years in prison. The warrant did not provide detail on the journalist’s alleged criminal conduct. On October 15, agents from Venezuela’s criminal and forensic investigative police bureau (CICPC) raided the home of Deniz’s parents in Caracas...


A step closer to justice for disappeared journalist Maksim Maksimov

After years of waiting, this week, the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) found that Russian authorities failed to conduct an effective investigation into the disappearance and alleged murder of investigative journalist Maksim Maksimovin 2004... Maksimov was last seen on June 29, 2004, and was investigating police corruption by senior officers of the Russian Ministry of Interior at the time of his death. Following the state’s failure to yield any tangible results in the case, Maksimov’s family... brought the case before the ECtHR, submitting that his murder was motivated by his journalistic activities, in particular his investigation into police corruption. “Maksim Maksimov is one of many Russian journalists whose case the Russian authorities have tried to sweep under the rug for too long”...


CPJ testifies at Helsinki Commission about press freedom threats in OSCE region

Freedom of the press is under severe threat across the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) region and the OSCE’s 57 participating states must do more to protect the safety of journalists, CPJ Deputy Executive Director Rob Mahoney told a United States Congress commission today... “CPJ research shows that journalists and independent media are under attack in nearly all OSCE countries,” Mahoney said in prepared remarks. “Without sustained and concerted support for journalists and pushback against attacks on the press, the region will only continue to see a worsening atmosphere for journalism”...


All from CPJ

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Okt. 23, 2021, 12:13 am

Journalist gets police apology for arrest over Kent barracks photos (Guardian)

A journalist who was arrested after taking pictures of a protest at a former army barracks used to house asylum seekers has received a full apology and payout from Kent police, who have admitted their actions were unlawful. Andy Aitchison was arrested at his home on 28 January on suspicion of criminal damage, hours after he had taken and shared photographs of activists demonstrating against conditions at Napier barracks near Folkestone. Aitchison was held for more than five hours before he was released with bail conditions that prohibited him from going near the barracks. Officers searched his family home and seized his mobile phone and a memory card from his camera. A week after the arrest the case against Aitchison was dropped, but he was subsequently issued with a fixed penalty notice (FPN), which was withdrawn only after his lawyers threatened legal proceedings. On Friday, his lawyers said he had received a full apology from the chief constable of Kent police, Alan Pughsley, which included admissions that the arrest, property search and imposition of bail conditions and FPN were all unlawful...


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Okt. 26, 2021, 9:15 am

NPR NPR | 5:42 AM · Oct 25, 2021:
Research shows that when local newspapers disappear or are dramatically gutted, communities tend to see lower voter turnout, higher polarization, and an environment in which misinformation can take hold.

When this hedge fund buys local newspapers, democracy suffers
-----------------------------------------------------------------

NPR's A Martínez talks to McKay Coppins of The Atlantic about how a hedge fund, Alden Global Capital, is buying and then gutting newspapers — and the implications for democracy.
Rachel Treisman | Updated October 18, 202111:58 AM ET
Heard on Morning Edition (7 min)
https://www.npr.org/2021/10/18/1046952430/the-consequences-of-when-a-hedge-fund-...

200John5918
Okt. 26, 2021, 11:56 pm

Former detainee journalist elated by Uhuru chat (Star)

"the President’s motorcade passed by and as soon as I turned my head, I heard someone call me ‘Mzee Kamau'. Ooh, it was the most unexpected person, President Uhuru Kenyatta calling me while in the co-driver's seat in his official car,” an elated Kamau said. The veteran journalist said the President caught him by surprise when he recognised him even after so many years. “As much as he was surrounded by hawk-eyed security officers, he told me to draw closer and greet him, and then we began chatting in the glare of thousands of locals who had turned up to acknowledge his presence. It was such an honour. I gave him my phone contacts after he requested me to, and assured me that he would invite me so that we could catch up in the near future"...

The journalist, who has over 35 years of experience, narrates that his friendship with the President dates back in the 90s when Kenyatta was the chair for the Kenya Tourism Board. He says he covered his events and continued even as Kenyatta graduated into politics... The journalist was in last year’s Mashujaa celebrations recognized by the state as a hero for his fight for multiparty democracy and freedom of speech during Kenya’s second liberation. Arrested in the same day of 1987 alongside notable figures such as ODM Party leader Raila Odinga... Kamau and his co-accused would be detained without trial and tortured in the notorious Nyayo chambers''...

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Okt. 27, 2021, 11:37 pm

Julian Assange could serve jail term in Australia, lawyer for the US tells London court (Guardian)

US authorities have told British judges that if they agree to extradite Julian Assange on espionage charges, the WikiLeaks founder could serve any US prison sentence he receives in his native Australia. In January, a lower UK court refused a US request to extradite Assange over WikiLeaks’ publication of secret US military documents a decade ago. District Judge Vanessa Baraitser ruled that Assange, who has spent years in hiding and in UK prisons as he fights extradition, was likely to take his own life if held under harsh US prison conditions...

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Okt. 28, 2021, 9:12 am

Justice remains elusive in the vast majority of journalist murders (CPJ)

Over the past decade, 226 of the 278 journalists killed in a nexus of corruption, organized crime, extremist groups, and government retaliation, have been murdered with impunity, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists’ 2021 Impunity Index, published today. The annual Index spotlights countries where journalists are murdered and their killers go free...

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Okt. 28, 2021, 11:41 pm

Assange extradition appeal: lawyers cite new claims of CIA plot to harm him (Guardian)

Lawyers for Julian Assange have cited new allegations that the CIA plotted to kidnap or kill him as “grounds for fearing what will be done to him” if he is extradited to the US to face espionage charges. The WikiLeaks founder’s legal team also described diplomatic assurances given by US authorities in an effort to overturn a ruling earlier this year against his extradition as meaningless, and not enough to overcome concerns about his risk of suicide were he to be sent to the US...

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Nov. 1, 2021, 11:53 pm

Two more Mexican journalists killed as reporters condemn worsening violence (Guardian)

Mexican journalists have expressed alarm after two veteran reporters were attacked in their own homes in less than 24 hours, bringing this year’s death toll for media workers to nine – already surpassing the eight deaths recorded in 2020.

Fredy López Arévalo, a veteran reporter in the southern state of Chiapas, was shot in the head inside his home in the city of San Cristóbal de las Casas on Thursday. López had covered Central American politics and the Zapatista uprising for news organisations such as Reuters, the Los Angeles Times and Notimex, and he still reported on the local political situation.

On the same day, Acapulco journalist Alfredo Cardoso was pulled from his home by masked gunmen who also threatened his family. He was found the next day having been shot five times, and died from his injuries in hospital on Sunday...


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Nov. 3, 2021, 12:49 am

How two BBC journalists risked their jobs to reveal the truth about Jimmy Savile (Guardian)

Rumours about Savile being a sexual predator and a paedophile had persisted for decades. In his trademark brightly coloured shell suits, scant shorts and string vests, Savile had performed his perversions almost as much as he’d hidden them. His manner almost dared people to challenge him. Because of the UK’s punitive libel laws, no one ever had. On the Monday morning after Savile’s death, in the Newsnight office at BBC Television Centre, social affairs correspondent Liz MacKean and producer Meirion Jones began to investigate Savile’s history...

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Nov. 3, 2021, 11:22 am

Mexican journalist Fredy López shot and killed in San Cristobal de las Casas (CPJ)

At about 8 p.m. on October 28, an unidentified man approached López outside his home in the city of San Cristobal de las Casas, in the southern state of Chiapas, and shot him several times, killing him at the scene... López had a long career as a reporter and editor in Mexico and Central America... “The brutal killing of journalist Fredy López continues the alarming trend of violence against reporters in Mexico, cementing its abysmal status among the world’s deadliest countries for the press”...

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Nov. 5, 2021, 12:18 am

Russia expels Dutch journalist Tom Vennink (Guardian)

Russia has expelled a Dutch reporter, his newspaper has said, as Moscow continues its crackdown on domestic and foreign journalists in the country. De Volkskrant journalist Tom Vennink said his visa was revoked and he was given three days to leave the country after difficulties renewing his journalist accreditation. The expulsion is the second of a foreign journalist in recent months, following Russia’s decision in August to ban the BBC reporter Sarah Rainsford from the country as a “security threat”...

an increasingly bitter relationship between Moscow and Amsterdam appears to have played a role in the decision...

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Nov. 5, 2021, 11:32 pm

Mexican journalist Alfredo Cardoso Echevarría abducted and killed in Acapulco (CPJ)

Cardoso, founder and editor of online news magazine Las Dos Costas, was abducted on October 28 from his home in Acapulco, on the Pacific coast in the southern Mexican state of Guerrero, by a group of masked, armed men... He was found the next day close to his residence with at least five gunshot wounds; despite being rushed to the hospital and undergoing surgery, he was pronounced dead on October 31...


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Bolivian journalists abducted, assaulted by armed men while covering land dispute (CPJ)

On October 28, seven reporters, photographers, and camera operators for several Bolivian media outlets were covering a land dispute in the eastern province of Guarayos when they were surrounded by armed men who shot at them, punched and kicked them, destroyed some of their equipment, and held six of them captive for about seven hours...


Ukrainian English-language newspaper Kyiv Post suspends publication (Guardian)

Ukraine’s oldest English-language newspaper the Kyiv Post has suspended publication after 26 years as its journalists accused the owner, a powerful oligarch, of “attacking” them. Adnan Kivan, a construction tycoon who bought the Kyiv Post three years ago, said in a statement that the newspaper will close immediately “for a short time”... Kyiv Post journalists then released a joint statement on Facebook, saying that all the employees were notified that they were “immediately” fired. About 50 people lost their jobs...

“We saw it as an attempt to infringe on our editorial independence,” the statement said. And the dismissal of the paper’s staff, they said, was an attempt to get rid “of inconvenient, fair and honest journalists”.


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Nov. 9, 2021, 10:25 pm

Car bombing kills pregnant Yemeni journalist in Aden (Guardian)

A pregnant Yemeni journalist has been killed in a car explosion in Aden, witnesses and medical sources said, in the latest incident of violence in Yemen’s southern port city. An initial police investigation indicated an explosive device was planted on Tuesday on the vehicle carrying Rasha Abdullah al-Harazi and her husband, Mahmoud al-Atmi, also a journalist...

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Bearbeitet: Nov. 12, 2021, 10:52 am

Myanmar junta jails US journalist Danny Fenster for 11 years (Guardian)

The US journalist Danny Fenster has been sentenced to 11 years in prison with hard labour by a court in military-ruled Myanmar after he was found guilty on a series of charges including incitement. Fenster, who is the managing editor of Frontier Myanmar, an independent outlet that has covered the military coup extensively, was arrested in May 2021 at Yangon International airport. He was due to fly back home to Michigan, where he planned to surprise his parents. He is the only foreign journalist to be convicted of a serious offence since the military seized power in February, and his detention has been widely condemned by rights groups, press freedom advocates and the US government...

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Nov. 12, 2021, 11:30 pm

What does impartiality mean? BBC no-bias policy being pushed to limits (Guardian)

Analysis: from anti-racism protests to trans rights, who gets to choose topics where impartiality matters is a live issue...

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Nov. 14, 2021, 3:12 am

Hong Kong denies visa to Economist journalist in latest media blow (Guardian)

Sue-lin Wong becomes latest foreign journalist to be forced out of the city as concerns about press access and freedoms grow...

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Cuba withdraws accreditation for five journalists from Spanish news agency EFE
Reuters | Nov 14, 2021

MADRID, Nov 14 (Reuters) - Five journalists from the Spanish news agency EFE have had their press accreditations withdrawn by the Cuban government ahead of a banned protest march by opposition groups planned for Monday*, EFE said.

https://www.reuters.com/business/media-telecom/cuba-withdraws-accreditation-five...

* https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/14/world/americas/cuba-protest.html
...Even in a country long accustomed to shortages of everything from food to freedom, it has been a remarkably bleak year in Cuba, with Covid-19 restrictions making life under tough new U.S. sanctions even harder.
...Hal Klepak, professor emeritus of history and strategy at the Royal Military College of Canada, said the scale of opposition the government has faced this year is unparalleled in Cuba’s history since the revolution.
...But the question remains whether ordinary Cubans will attend Monday’s protest, considering the government declared it illegal, and its organizers have toned down their calls.
The protest was scheduled on the very day that quarantine rules are being lifted, tourists are being welcomed back and children are set to return to school. The wave of Covid-19 fatalities that helped fuel the July protest has largely subsided, and 70 percent of the nation is now fully vaccinated....

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Proposed Salvadoran ‘foreign agent’ law could impact media organizations (CPJ)

Proposed by Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele and presented to congress on November 9, the law would require individuals and organizations receiving international funds to register as “foreign agents” with the Ministry of Interior, according to a report by Salvadoran news website El Faro. The rules would apply to a broad range of organizations and individuals, including media outlets and individual journalists...


Unidentified attackers shoot at car of Mexican journalist Beatriz Flores after she received threatening call (CPJ)

Flores told CPJ via telephone call that on November 9, a woman who did not identify herself called her in response to an article she wrote for the Facebook-based news site Flores founded and edits, Presencia Hidalguense, which counts some 67,000 followers, about the arrest of a man who allegedly transported stolen horses in La Colmena, in Hidalgo. According to Flores, the caller insisted that Flores did not have permission to publish photos accompanying the article, which were provided to her by local police, of a truck allegedly used to transport the stolen horses. Flores said the woman also insisted that local gang Los Rábanos was not responsible for the alleged theft, even though the article did not blame the gang. Flores said the woman ended the conversation by threatening that there “would be consequences” if she did not delete the article. Hours later, in the early morning of November 10, unknown attackers shot several rounds into Flores’ car...


Sudan releases Al Jazeera’s bureau chief (Al Jazeera)

El Musalmi El Kabbashi was arrested amid nationwide protests against Sudan’s military coup; journalists stage rally to denounce ‘campaign’ targeting them...


Peru opens criminal investigation into Ojo Público’s Ernesto Cabral over corruption reporting (CPJ)

On November 9, Ojo Público, a Lima-based news website, reported that government prosecutors are seeking an order to force Cabral to reveal his sources and the Peruvian attorney general’s office had opened a preliminary investigation of the journalist for his reporting on a corruption scandal involving former Peruvian President Ollanta Humala and his former adviser Martín Belaunde, a businessman...


CPJ concerned over FBI raid on home of Project Veritas founder James O’Keefe (CPJ)

the FBI seized O’Keefe’s cellphones during a November 6 raid on his home in Mamaroneck, New York, as part of a court-ordered investigation into the theft of a diary belonging to Ashley Biden, U.S. President Joe Biden’s daughter. In a statement, Project Veritas wrote that authorities also raided the apartments and homes of other current and former members of the organization, and confiscated unspecified materials. Project Veritas acquired the diary in 2020 but turned it over to law enforcement...

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Nov. 19, 2021, 7:20 am

Conferral of the rank of Knight and Dame of the Grand Cross of the Pian Order to Mr. Philip Pullella and Ms. Valentina Alazraki,
Holy see Press Office | 13.11.2021

...three verbs that I (Pope Francis) believe characterise good journalism: listen, investigate and report.

...Today we are in great need of journalists and communicators who are passionate about reality, capable of finding the treasures often hidden in the folds of our society and recounting them, allowing us to be impressed, to learn, to broaden our minds, to grasp aspects that we did not know before...

https://press.vatican.va/content/salastampa/en/bollettino/pubblico/2021/11/13/21...

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Bearbeitet: Nov. 20, 2021, 11:26 pm

CPJ calls on Canadian police to release detained journalists (CPJ)

The Committee to Protect Journalists today expressed grave concern about the Royal Canadian Mounted Police’s arrest and detention yesterday of two journalists covering land rights protests in northern British Columbia. Photojournalist Amber Bracken, who was on assignment for the environmental news outlet the Narwhal, and independent documentary filmmaker Michael Toledano were covering ongoing demonstrations against the construction of the Coastal GasLink pipeline through Indigenous Wet’suwet’en territory at the time of their arrests, according to the Canadian Association of Journalists. The CAJ says both journalists are still in custody...


CPJ extremely concerned by court order restricting New York Times coverage (CPJ)

The Committee to Protect Journalists today expressed grave concern over a New York Supreme Court order restricting the New York Times’ coverage of Project Veritas. Yesterday, Judge Charles Wood issued an order blocking the newspaper from publishing materials concerning Project Veritas, a conservative nonprofit that targets groups it perceives as left-leaning, according to news reports and a copy of that court order...


UN urges China to free seriously ill journalist jailed over Wuhan Covid reporting (Guardian)

The United Nations has urged China to release a citizen journalist jailed for her coverage of the country’s Covid-19 response and who her family say is close to death after a hunger strike. The UN rights office voiced alarm at reports that 38-year-old Zhang Zhan’s health was deteriorating rapidly and that her life was at serious risk from the hunger strike...


Somali journalist Abdiaziz Mohamud Guled killed in suicide attack (BBC)

A prominent Somali journalist who was a critic of the Islamist militant group al-Shabab has been killed in a suicide bomb attack in the capital, Mogadishu. Abdiaziz Mohamud Guled, also known as Abdiaziz Afrika, was targeted as he was leaving a restaurant in the city shortly after midday. Two other people nearby were injured in the blast and taken to hospital. Al-Shabab said it was behind the attack and had targeted the journalist, who worked for Radio Mogadishu...


Sudan’s military coup and the stifling of speech (Al Jazeera)

Net jamming and journalist arrests, the military junta is squeezing speech in Sudan...


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Nov. 21, 2021, 11:01 pm

Kenyan police investigate BBC worker's death in Nairobi (BBC)

Police in Kenya have launched an investigation after a BBC staff member was found dead in the capital Nairobi. Kate Mitchell, a British national who worked for BBC Media Action in a number of African countries, died on Friday. BBC Media Action is the corporation's international charity, and its projects focus on using media and communication to address inequality around the world. It is not thought Ms Mitchell's death at a hotel in the city was connected to her work for the organisation. And while the exact circumstances of her death remain unclear, police told local media they were investigating it as a murder and exploring possible motives...


War photographer: 'Telling people's stories gives me hope' (BBC)

A photographer who has covered Iraq, Afghanistan and other conflict zones, has said there were times she felt compelled to put her camera down and help medics. While she said being behind the lens in dangerous places could give you a "professional distance", she had felt the need to act in some moments. "There were times when the medics needed help, so I put my camera down and I would just do whatever I could," she said. "Those times were much harder, emotionally to deal with."

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Nov. 23, 2021, 11:26 pm

Afghan journalists decry Taliban rules restricting role of women on TV (Guardian)

Journalists asked to wear a hijab and broadcasters told to stop showing dramas featuring female actors...

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Nov. 29, 2021, 10:44 pm

China surveillance of journalists to use 'traffic-light' system (BBC)

The Chinese province of Henan is building a surveillance system with face-scanning technology that can detect journalists and other "people of concern". Documents seen by BBC News describe a system that classifies journalists into a "traffic-light" system - green, amber and red. Journalists in the "red" category would be "dealt with accordingly", they say... Human Rights Watch said: "This is not a government that needs more power to track more people... especially those who might be trying to peacefully hold it accountable"...

221John5918
Bearbeitet: Nov. 30, 2021, 10:54 pm

Sunday Times editor admits report on media coverage of Islam has ‘valid criticisms’ (Guardian)

The editor of the Sunday Times has said British newspapers have made mistakes in their coverage of Muslims, ahead of the launch of a report that concludes the British media is highly critical of Islam. Emma Tucker, who took over as editor of the newspaper last year, said she welcomed the report by the Muslim Council of Britain “in the full knowledge that it contains criticisms of the press, my own paper included”... said her newspaper needed to hire more diverse staff to ensure it improved its coverage of Islam...


CNN's Chris Cuomo suspended over help to governor brother (BBC)

CNN star Chris Cuomo has been suspended indefinitely over help he gave his ex-New York governor brother while he was battling sex abuse allegations... CNN said the documents show "a greater level of involvement in his brother's efforts than we previously knew"... Chris Cuomo's behind-the-scenes efforts to help his politician brother were widely considered a breach of journalistic ethics in the media industry... The host began interviewing his brother on air and praising his leadership as governor...


Italian football fan banned for 'slapping' journalist live on TV (BBC)

Italian police have banned a football fan from sporting events for three years after he allegedly slapped the bottom of a female reporter live on TV. The man was filmed moving his hand towards Greta Beccaglia as she faced the camera after a Serie A football match in Florence. The incident on Saturday prompted anger and solidarity with the reporter. Ms Beccaglia of Toscana TV filed a harassment complaint against the man, who is under police investigation...

222JanEPat
Dez. 2, 2021, 1:46 pm

>1 aspirit: When I was an active journalist and traveled abroad 20 years ago, I never put "JOURNALIST" on my printed records. VERY SAD that today Trump and his cronies have vilified journalists.

Journalism is the fourth estate after president, congress and supreme court.
Now they're all subject to corruption, criticism and death threats.
Sad and frightening

223John5918
Dez. 3, 2021, 8:53 am

Freelance journalist Andrey Kuznechyk detained in Belarus (CPJ)

On November 25, Kuznechyk, a freelance correspondent for Radio Svaboda, the Belarusian-language service of the U.S. Congress-funded broadcaster Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL), returned to his home in Minsk, the capital, after going out for a bike ride, accompanied by four men dressed in plain clothes, according to Radio Svaboda, citing the journalist’s wife Alesya Rak. The four men searched the apartment and took mobile phones belonging to the journalist and his wife and money, Rak told RFE/RL. They then ordered Kuznechyk to go with them and said they were taking the journalist for a couple of days without disclosing charges against him, Rak said. Rak told RFE/FL that the men did not identify themselves as law enforcement, but RFE/RL President Jamie Fly described them in a report by RFE/RL as “agents of the regime” who “kidnapped” Kuznechyk for “nothing more than being a journalist”...


Clarín media group offices firebombed in Argentina (CPJ)

At about 11 p.m. on November 22, a group of assailants threw several explosives into the Buenos Aires headquarters of the Clarín Group, the largest media conglomerate in Argentina, which includes the offices of the Clarín newspaper, according to news reports and Clarín Group spokesperson Martín Etchevers, who spoke to CPJ via messaging app. Surveillance footage showed about nine people involved in the attack, and the assailants fled on motorcycles after throwing the bombs, according to Etchevers and those reports. The bombs caused several small fires, which either burned out or were extinguished by firefighters who arrived at the scene, Etchevers said, adding that no one was injured in the attack and that the bombs did not cause significant damage to the building...


224John5918
Dez. 4, 2021, 11:11 pm

Nobel winner: ‘We journalists are the defence line between dictatorship and war’ (Guardian)

Next week, Maria Ressa and Dmitry Muratov receive their Nobel peace prizes. In a rare interview, Muratov says he fears the world is sliding towards fascism...


225John5918
Dez. 6, 2021, 10:45 pm

How an Afghan reporter was left to the Taliban by the Foreign Office (Guardian)

Fahim, a journalist who had worked with British media organisations, was one of thousands of Afghans who approached the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) for help to escape Afghanistan after the Taliban’s conquest this summer. Told he was cleared to travel with his family to the UK, he was also one of the many left behind as the promised help from the FCDO failed to materialise. A Panjshiri journalist, Fahim (not his real name) has not slept in the same house for more two nights in a row since the Taliban takeover four months ago, fearful for his life...

226John5918
Dez. 7, 2021, 11:33 pm

French police arrest man in connection with Jamal Khashoggi killing (Guardian)

French police have arrested a man on suspicion of being a former member of the Saudi royal guard accused of being involved in the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi. The man, named as Khalid Aedh al-Otaibi, was taken into custody at Paris’s Charles de Gaulle airport as he was about to board a plane to the Saudi capital, Riyadh...


227John5918
Dez. 8, 2021, 10:32 pm

The Guardian named news provider of the year and wins four other awards (Guardian)

Guardian and Observer journalists have won five awards at the British Journalism Awards (BJA), including the coveted news provider of the year...

228John5918
Dez. 9, 2021, 10:32 am

Number of journalists imprisoned around the world sets new record (CPJ)

The number of journalists behind bars reached a record high in 2021, with 293 behind bars as political upheaval and media crackdowns reflect increasing intolerance for independent reporting around the world. At the same time, targeted killings of journalists persist, with 24 documented by the Committee to Protect Journalists in its annual prison census and survey of attacks on the press.

China continues to be the world’s worst jailer, with CPJ’s 2021 prison census documenting 50 behind bars as the country prepares to host the Beijing Winter Olympics in February 2022. It is followed by Myanmar (26), which arrested scores of reporters in a wave of repression following its February 1 military coup, then Egypt (25), Vietnam (23) and Belarus (19). For the first time, CPJ’s census includes journalists jailed in Hong Kong... In Ethiopia, an escalating civil war prompted new media restrictions that saw it emerge as the second-worst jailer of journalists in sub-Saharan Africa, after Eritrea...

229John5918
Dez. 10, 2021, 9:23 am

South Sudan’s Catholic Radio Network to receive 2021 Pax Christi International Peace Award

Established in 2006, the radio network connects community-based radio stations in order to share trustworthy news and promote civic engagement. It also provides valuable public education about the Comprehensive Peace Agreement and democratic processes, which are critical for the world’s newest country. It has a reach of upward of 7 million people across the region. The CRN delivers programming that promotes reconciliation and the healing of trauma to the people of South Sudan. It provides an important platform for constructive dialogue, offers reliable information, and gives special attention to marginalised groups including women, children, and those who cannot read or write. A coordinated, grassroots public radio system is a vital tool for nourishing hope and peace in South Sudan as it effects change in homes and communities throughout the country...

230John5918
Dez. 10, 2021, 12:03 pm

Julian Assange can be extradited to the US, court rules (BBC)

Wikileaks founder Julian Assange can be extradited from the UK to the US, the High Court has ruled. The US won its appeal against a January UK court ruling that he could not be extradited due to concerns over his mental health. Judges were reassured by US promises to reduce the risk of suicide. His fiancee said they intended to appeal...


UK ruling on extraditing Wikileaks’ Assange ‘seriously damages journalism’ (CPJ)

The Committee to Protect Journalists today expressed deep disappointment at a British court’s decision to uphold the United States Justice Department’s appeal to extradite Julian Assange, which allows the U.S. to continue pursuing the extradition of the WikiLeaks founder, according to news reports. “On the same day the Nobel Peace Prize honors journalists, a UK court ruled that the United States can extradite Julian Assange, a move that seriously damages journalism,” said CPJ Deputy Executive Director Robert Mahoney. “The U.S. Justice Department’s dogged pursuit of the WikiLeaks founder has set a harmful legal precedent for prosecuting reporters simply for interacting with their sources. The Biden administration pledged at its Summit for Democracy this week to support journalism. It could start by removing the threat of prosecution under the Espionage Act now hanging over the heads of investigative journalists everywhere”...

231John5918
Dez. 10, 2021, 11:19 pm

Journalists Maria Ressa and Dmitry Muratov receive Nobel peace prize (Guardian)

Filipina and Russian attend Oslo ceremony despite legal cases filed against Ressa and are first journalists to win since 1935...


Nobel Peace Prize: Maria Ressa attacks social media 'toxic sludge' (BBC)

One of the winners of this year's Nobel Peace Prize has attacked US internet companies for what she called a "flood of toxic sludge" on social media. During her acceptance speech in Norway, Philippine journalist Maria Ressa said technology giants had "allowed a virus of lies to infect each of us". Ms Ressa, co-founder of the news site Rappler, accused sites such as Facebook of profiting from spreading hate... She went on to accuse US internet giants of being "biased against facts and journalists" and of using their "God-like power" to sow division. "Our greatest need today is to transform that hate and violence, the toxic sludge that's coursing through our information ecosystem," she said...

Mr Muratov, 60, urged guests at the ceremony to observe a minute's silence for journalists killed in the course of their work, and said the profession was going through "a dark time" in Russia...

232John5918
Dez. 11, 2021, 11:03 pm

Scott Morrison urged to end ‘lunacy’ and push UK and US for Julian Assange’s release (Guardian)

Australian parliamentarians have demanded the prime minister, Scott Morrison, intervene in the case of Julian Assange, an Australian citizen, after the United States won a crucial appeal in its fight to extradite the WikiLeaks founder on espionage charges. “The prime minister must get Assange home,” the Australian Greens leader, Adam Bandt, told Guardian Australia on Saturday. “An Australian citizen is being prosecuted for publishing details of war crimes, yet our government sits on its hands and does nothing.” The independent MP Andrew Wilkie called on Morrison to “end this lunacy” and demand the US and UK release Assange...


Australian government stares down calls to press UK and US for Julian Assange’s release (Guardian)

The Australian government is staring down calls to intervene to secure Julian Assange’s freedom, after a British court cleared the way for the WikiLeaks co-founder to be extradited to the US to face espionage charges. The government said it was monitoring the Australian citizen’s case closely, but would “continue to respect the UK legal process – including any further appeals under UK law” – and emphasised Australia was “not a party to the case”...

233John5918
Dez. 14, 2021, 11:43 am

Colombian legislature passes anti-corruption bill that threatens press freedom (CPJ)

On December 6, the Colombian Chamber of Representatives passed Bill 369, the “Anti-Corruption Bill,” which includes an article that could be used to stifle the press, according to press reports and a statement by the Bogotá-based Foundation for Press Freedom (FLIP). Article 221A of the bill, which CPJ reviewed, empowers judges to suspend or cancel the legal status of any organization whose members defame or slander any active or former government official... “Colombia is headed in the wrong direction: instead of eliminating its existing criminal defamation laws, lawmakers are adding an additional penalty, which could even strip media outlets of their legal status”...

234John5918
Dez. 14, 2021, 10:55 pm

Peruvian journalist receives threatening messages, demands to stop reporting on local officials (CPJ)

On December 1, Roque, editor of the independent Diario Hechicera newspaper in the northern city of Tumbes, published a story about possible irregularities in the contract process to build a public school in Contralmirante Villar, a nearby township, according to Peru’s National Journalists Association and Roque who spoke to CPJ via messaging app. A few hours after publishing, Roque received notarized letters from two Contralmirante Villar officials mentioned in the story, Luis Richard Fiestas Chunga and Gian André Miñano Briceño, Roque told CPJ. In the letters, published by Diario Hechicero, Fiestas and Miñano threated to file criminal defamation lawsuits and demanded that Roque stop writing about them and issue a retraction, without specifying what they objected to in his article. In Peru, defamation is a criminal offense punishable by prison. Later that day, Roque received six Facebook messages from accounts he did not recognize that discouraged him from continuing to report on Contralmirante Villar officials and threatened him if he continued to do so, he told CPJ. Two of the messages were death threats...


Photojournalist in Myanmar dies in military custody a week after arrest (Guardian)

A freelance photojournalist in Myanmar has died in military custody after being arrested last week while covering protests. Soe Naing is the first journalist known to have died in custody since the army seized power in February, ousting the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi. More than 100 journalists have been detained since then, though about half have been released. Soe Naing was arrested Friday when he and a colleague were in downtown Yangon taking photos during a “silent strike” called by opponents of military rule... Soe Naing is not the first detainee to die in government custody. There is no clear total, but the others reported dead while in custody have been political activists and members of Aung San Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy party. In several cases where the bodies could be seen, they bore marks that suggested the individuals had been tortured...

235John5918
Dez. 15, 2021, 9:19 am

Riccardo Ehrman: Journalist who prompted Berlin Wall to fall dies (BBC)

Italian journalist Riccardo Ehrman, who will always be remembered for asking the decisive question that led to communist East Germany opening up the Berlin Wall, has died aged 92. It was Ehrman who in 1989 prompted government spokesman Günter Schabowski to explain that private travel would be allowed outside East Germany. And when pressed on when that would happen, Schabowski eventually announced "right now, immediately". Within hours the wall came down...

236John5918
Dez. 15, 2021, 10:57 pm

Hong Kong: Media tycoon Jimmy Lai gets 13 months jail for Tiananmen vigil (BBC)

Hong Kong media mogul Jimmy Lai has been sentenced to 13 months in jail for participating in a vigil marking the 1989 Tiananmen massacre in Beijing. The 74-year-old was found guilty last week of inciting others to take part in an unlawful assembly. He was among thousands who defied a ban to attend last year's vigil marking the killings in the Chinese capital. More than two dozen Hong Kong politicians and activists have been charged over the vigil. Lai was one of eight activists sentenced on Monday. They included prominent names like journalist-turned-opposition politician Gwyneth Ho and lawyer Chow Hang Tung...


A press freedom crisis unfolds in Latin America (CPJ)

As the number of journalists imprisoned globally for their work climbs to record highs, cases of those behind bars in Latin America remained relatively low. A total of six – three in Cuba, two in Nicaragua and one in Brazil – were in custody for their work as of December 1, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists’ 2021 prison census. But these figures don’t tell the whole story of the decline of press freedom in the region.

Year after year, the number of journalists killed in relation to their work in Latin America has surpassed the number of those in jail at the time of CPJ’s prison census. This year is no different. Though the global number of murdered journalists declined from 2020 to 2021, Mexico remains the Western hemisphere’s deadliest country for the press. As of December 1, CPJ documented nine cases of journalists killed in Mexico alone. Of those, three were clearly targeted for their work and CPJ is still investigating the motives for the killing of the other six, as well as the case of Jorge Molontzín Centlal, who has been missing since March.

Even those numbers don’t fully capture the potential for violence that threatens the region’s journalists. This year alone, in addition to those reporters killed in Mexico, Colombia and Haiti, others in Mexico, Brazil, Colombia and Haiti narrowly survived shooting attacks. While deadly violence remains a major form of censorship in countries like Mexico and Colombia, the tactics for silencing journalists in Latin America and the Caribbean are evolving, appearing in legislation and court decisions across the region...


237John5918
Dez. 16, 2021, 10:58 am

Unidentified attackers beat Cuban journalist Mabel Páez at her home (CPJ)

On December 7, at about 8:30 p.m., two unidentified men with their faces covered broke into Páez’s home in the western province of Artemisa and attacked her... Páez is the director of the community newspaper El Majadero de Artemisa... The men punched and kicked Páez repeatedly and left her bleeding on the floor... she received bruises, swelling, and scratches on her left eyebrow, mouth, nose, arms, right hand, and torso. The men did not take anything from her home, and before leaving on a motorcycle one of them told Páez, “this is the first warning,” according to that report...


Our strategy to build better journalism (The New Humanitarian)

The current journalistic model is broken: Audiences are demanding that the hierarchical, elite-led system of news-gathering and presentation be dismantled in favour of a more inclusive and holistic model based on more equitable access to information and more nuanced and diverse narratives... We think there is a better way. We want to build something different...

First, we will decolonise our journalism – by being more inclusive of and guided by the communities we serve – so that we better represent the issues that matter to them. Standard international reporting is a legacy of an old model in which foreigners with little knowledge or experience of a country parachute in to tell a story in service of a foreign audience...

Second, we will centralise impact in our work – by proactively mapping and reaching out to the audiences that can be served by a given story – so that every story finds the audience that can use it to drive change...

Third, we will strengthen our newsroom – by investing in key editorial functions and support systems – so that we can more consistently report from the heart of crises...

Fourth, we will diversify our income – by growing grant funding and developing new revenue streams – so that our journalism remains independent and sustainable...

Finally, we will nurture an organisational culture of excitement, innovation, and well-being so that staff feel valued, proud, and motivated to do their best work...

238John5918
Bearbeitet: Dez. 16, 2021, 11:11 pm

How Russia tries to censor Western social media (BBC)

Google and Meta face the threat of multi-million-dollar fines for failing to delete content that the Russian government considers illegal - but a close look at court papers reveals these are often simply posts about protests in support of jailed opposition leader Alexei Navalny... The Russian government told Facebook to remove the post because of its "blatant disrespect towards the state, the constitution and the president of the Russian Federation"... But the cases highlight the difficulty of operating in a country where restrictions are placed on freedom of speech and political activity...


CPJ urges US House committee to drop subpoena of journalist Amy Harris’s phone records (CPJ)

The U.S. House Select Committee investigating the January 6 riot at the Capitol should drop its subpoena of journalist Amy Harris’s phone records, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today. On December 2, Harris’s telecom provider, Verizon, informed the journalist that the company had received a subpoena seeking all of the communication records associated with her phone number, including text messages and calls, from November 1, 2020, through January 31, 2021, according to the National Press Photographers Association, a professional advocacy group of which Harris is a member, and a lawsuit that Harris filed yesterday. The committee first filed the subpoena to Verizon on November 24, according to the lawsuit. In her suit, filed against the committee and its chairperson, Mississippi Representative Bennie Thompson, Harris argued that the subpoena violated her rights under the First and Fourth Amendments, pertaining to freedom of the press and unlawful searches respectively, as well as the D.C. Shield Law, which protects reporters’ unpublished source material. During the time included in the subpoena, Harris was covering the Proud Boys, a far-right group whose members are accused of helping to coordinate the January 6 riot. “The U.S. House committee investigating the January 6 riot at the Capitol must respect reporters’ rights to keep their source material confidential, which is a cornerstone of press freedom”...


“Back to the former lies”: Sudan reverts to media repression post-coup (African Arguments)

journalist Ali Farsab... His scalp was grazed by a bullet before soldiers beat him, fracturing his hand as his head bled. When his assailants saw protestors filming them, they carried Farsab to a side alley and continued to hit him... Farsab says the blows and insults only increased once the soldiers learnt he was a reporter for the independent newspaper ­Al-Tayyar. He was held for three days, during which he was denied medical treatment, before his eventual release...

Since 25 October, hope in a transition towards democracy has been dealt a serious blow. According to Farsab, one of the first casualties of the coup was Sudan’s newfound freedom of expression. Just before midnight on 24 October, the former information minister reported on Facebook that military forces had stormed the state broadcaster in Omdurman and arrested employees. First thing on the morning of 25 October, Burhan then issued a “presidential decree” to dismiss the General Director of the national news agency SUNA. Its website went down for almost a week, while its offices remained closed for the first time since the 1970s. According to Hassan Farouk, a member of the Sudanese Journalists Network, SUNA’s staff were also summarily fired and replaced with former Bashir cadres. “We almost had a professional news wire during the transitional period,” says freelance journalist Mohamed Saleh. “Now we’re back to the former lies”...


239John5918
Dez. 19, 2021, 11:45 pm

‘We need free speech’: protests erupt across Poland over controversial media bill (Guardian)

Poles have staged nationwide protests including a thousands-strong rally outside the presidential palace to demand the head of state veto a law they say would limit media freedoms in the European Union’s largest eastern member. Unexpectedly rushed through parliament on Friday, the legislation would tighten rules around foreign ownership of media, specifically affecting the ability of news channel TVN24, owned by US media company Discovery Inc, to operate...

240John5918
Dez. 23, 2021, 11:52 pm

‘We don’t have a limit’: Yasuyoshi Chiba – agency photographer of 2021 (Guardian)

Yasuyoshi Chiba has been chosen by the picture desk as its agency photographer of the year. We hear from the AFP photojournalist...

241John5918
Bearbeitet: Dez. 27, 2021, 11:06 pm

Inter-American Court of Human Rights finds Ecuador responsible in El Universo libel case (CPJ)

The Committee to Protect Journalists today welcomed a recent decision by the Inter-American Court of Human Rights to hold Ecuador responsible for violating the right to free expression in a 2011 libel suit against the El Universo newspaper. “The Inter-American Court’s decision in the El Universo case offers long-overdue international recognition of one of the most flagrant examples of officials’ use of defamation laws to harass the press during Rafael Correa’s presidency,” said CPJ Latin America and the Caribbean Program Coordinator Natalie Southwick. “The ruling leaves no doubt that it is past time for Ecuador to repeal its outdated and dangerous criminal defamation laws”...


Afghan ex-BBC journalist stranded for months due to Home Office scheme delays (Guardian)

An Afghan former BBC journalist who managed to flee the Taliban has been stranded in a refugee camp for months because of delays to a resettlement scheme promised by the UK government... the only one of 14 former BBC employees to have escaped Afghanistan since the Taliban took over in August. The other 13 remain in hiding in fear of their lives...


242John5918
Bearbeitet: Dez. 29, 2021, 1:26 am

Argentine newspaper El Chubut offices torched, ransacked amid protests (CPJ)

At around 8:40 p.m. on December 20, a group of unidentified people gathered at the newspaper’s headquarters in the city of Trelew, in the southern province of Chubut, and threw rocks and firebombs into the building, breaking windows and setting several fires, according to news reports and El Chubut politics section chief Rubén Darío Giménez, who spoke with CPJ via messaging app. The attackers entered the building, which also houses the outlet’s radio station, and ransacked it for several hours, damaging and stealing equipment and archival materials, Giménez said. Journalists and staff were evacuated by police, and no one was injured, he told CPJ...


Hong Kong police arrest six people from independent outlet Stand News (Guardian)

Hundreds of Hong Kong national security police have raided the office of online pro-democracy media outlet Stand News and arrested six people, including senior staff, for “conspiracy to publish seditious publications”, in the latest crackdown on independent press in the territory... The raid further raises concerns about the freedom of speech and that of the media in the former British colony, which returned to Chinese rule in 1997...


In 2021, Myanmar journalists risked lives to tell world of coup (Al Jazeera)

With one journalist dead and dozens behind bars, Myanmar is now one of the world’s worst places to be a media worker...


243John5918
Dez. 29, 2021, 10:47 pm

Speed of Stand News shutdown sends chilling signal to Hong Kong’s media (Guardian)

The Christmas attack on Hong Kong website Stand News was no great surprise in a city where all forms of political opposition are being dismantled wholesale, but the scale, speed and nature of the operation to shutter this pro-democracy website were still shocking. Over 200 police officers swept into the newsroom, and others fanned out over the city making arrests under a harsh sedition law from the days of British colonial rule that had been gathering dust for decades.

Activists warned that the legal charges used against the website could effectively make any critical journalism illegal in Hong Kong, after a senior police officer said they were based in part on publication of news reports that “incited hatred towards the Hong Kong government”. “They are making it illegal to do honest reporting,” said Nathan Law, exiled pro-democracy activist. “If you ‘incite hatred’ to the government by reporting truthful news, you are also subject to this law, which means you can only talk about the positive side of the government now. This is the signal they are trying to send”...

244John5918
Dez. 30, 2021, 9:27 am

‘Journalism is not sedition’: Blinken urges release of seven arrested in Hong Kong media raids (Guardian)

The US has called on Chinese and Hong Kong authorities to release the seven people linked to the now-shuttered independent news outlet Stand News who were arrested on sedition charges during a police crackdown on Wednesday. Secretary of state Antony Blinken said in a statement: “We call on PRC {People’s Republic of China} and Hong Kong authorities to cease targeting Hong Kong’s free and independent media and to immediately release those journalists and media executives who have been unjustly detained and charged. “A confident government that is unafraid of the truth embraces a free press.” Blinken said “journalism is not sedition”, and that “by silencing independent media, PRC and local authorities undermine Hong Kong’s credibility and viability”...

245John5918
Dez. 31, 2021, 2:42 am

At least four anti-coup protesters shot dead in Sudan as security forces raid broadcasters (CNN)

Thursday's demonstrations were unfolding as Sudanese security forces sought to censor some broadcasters from reporting on them, according to accounts from multiple media outlets. Authorities raided the offices of Saudi broadcaster al-Arabiya and its sister outlet al-Hadath, confiscating equipment and assaulting the staff in Khartoum on Thursday, al-Arabiya said in a series of tweets. "Sudanese security forces raids the offices of al-Arabiya and al-Hadath and confiscate(d) equipment," al-Arabiya said. "Injuries among the staff of al-Arabiya and al-Hadath as a result of assault by Sudanese security forces," another al-Arabiya tweet said. "Sudanese security forces assault and beat the reporters of al-Arabiya, Lina Yacoub and Nizar Biqdawi, and assault and beat photojournalists and producers." Earlier in the day, a Qatar-based TV station said its reporters were prevented from reporting on protests. During a live televised broadcast Thursday, Asharq News correspondent Sally Othman apologized to viewers saying she couldn't continue the broadcast because Sudanese authorities were stopping her from doing so. "...Pardon me, I am not able to continue the reporting the authorities have prevented me just now from continuing, pardon me," Othman said on air. Hours later, Asharq News said that staff had been detained by security forces, posting an image of Othman with the message. The US Embassy in Khartoum condemned Thursday's violence, adding that "We also deplore the violent attacks by Sudan's security services on media outlets and journalists, and urge authorities to protect the freedom of the press"...
Dieses Thema wurde unter Journalism: a dangerous job, and oft well done (2022) weitergeführt.