On this World Press Freedom, the Committee to Protect Journalists is highlighting four cases of reporters who remain in prison in Cameroon, a destabilized and increasingly repressive nation led for nearly four decades by President Paul Biya. What began in October 2016 as peaceful protests led by professionals seeking equal…
Gambian journalist Deyda Hydara was assassinated while headed home from work in Banjul in December 2004. He was a fierce critic of former dictator Yahya Jammeh, and an advocate for press freedom working with The Point newspaper, AFP and Reporters Without Borders. He is one of many African journalists who…
A leading English-language newspaper in Tanzania has been shut down for a week after a story on the country’s currency angered government officials, who accused The Citizen of publishing fake news. The Kiswahili site for The Citizen remained functional, with an explanation of what happened. “The closing of The Citizen…
Contra Nocendi, a Paris-based NGO focusing on human rights in Burundi, Cameroon and other African nations, joined in the chorus of voices to welcome Tuesday’s announcement that journalists who are harassed, detained and killed for their work are Time Magazine’s “Person of the Year” for 2018. “It is always vital…
The Committee to Protect Journalists is calling on authorities in Tanzania to release two CPJ staffers they say were detained Wednesday night in Dar es Salaam. Angela Quintal, the CPJ coordinator for Africa, right, and colleague Muthoki Mumo went missing from their hotel room after officers who said they were…
Egyptian photojournalist Mahmoud Abu Zeid, known as “Shawkan,” was sentenced to five years in prison on Saturday – five years that he has already spent behind bars after he was arrested while covering a demonstration at Rabaa Al-Adawiya Square in Cairo on August 14, 2013. Shawkan was convicted of murder…
This week Egyptian photojournalist Mahmoud Abu Zeid will be awarded the 2018 UNESCO-Guillermo Cano Press Freedom Prize during World Press Freedom Day, hosted this year by Ghana. As with the many recipients before him, he won’t see the conference sessions or attend the gala dinner in Accra. The Egyptian, known…
A final ruling in the case of a Mauritanian blogger who faces execution on apostasy charges has been postponed yet again, as the Supreme Court of Mauritania — expected to deliver a ruling Tuesday — sent the case back to an appeals court. Thousands of people crowded into the capital city of Nouakchott…
Ethiopian journalists Khalid Mohammed Ahmed, 26, and Darsema Sori Banqash, 48, were sentenced Tuesday to lengthy prison terms on anti-state charges. The former will serve five years and six months, while the latter, because of a health condition, will serve for four years and five months, the court determined. The…
Burundi officials say they have notified the United Nations of their intent to withdraw from the International Criminal Court, a move that comes amid growing resentment and rejection of The Hague in some African nations – and in the context of a Burundi crackdown on dissent and press freedoms. Burundi…
Two journalists working in South Sudan and Somalia were found dead this week, in the latest attacks on reporters across the African continent. Radio Shabelle said one of its journalists, Abdi Aziz Ali, was shot and killed on his way home to the Yaqshid district of Mogadishu late Tuesday. Witnesses…
Two journalists have been arrested by the government in Ethiopia as deadly demonstrations continue in the Oromia region. The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), an independent nonprofit organization promoting press freedoms, on Sunday released a statement calling “on authorities in Ethiopia to release the editor-in-chief of Negere Ethiopia online newspaper,…