Pity those of us who monitor the ups and downs of China’s popular microblog platform, Sina Weibo. For every story its users spread in defiance of local censorship, there follows a clampdown.

Whether it’s the latest strike against rumors, or real name registration, or newly banned keywords, there’s always another restriction in the works as the service struggles to keep a lid on sensitive conversations without driving away its user base. “China tightens grip on social media,” we might report, as the Financial Times did in April. And last October. (The U.K.-based newspaper also noted China’s grip tightening on lawyers in March.) It’s not that these headlines are misleading. They simply show how difficult it is to illustrate the grip that always tightens, but never quite suffocates.

View post:
Blog: Chinese microblog regulates, suspends users–again

CPJ’s new analysis identifies Eritrea, North Korea, Syria, Iran as worst

Originally posted here:
10 Most Censored Countries

News of blind legal activist Chen Guangcheng has been censored for months. International news reports of his escape last week from incarceration in his home in Linyi, Shandong–apparently to U.S. protection, although his whereabouts remain unclear–has only intensified that censorship. That is unlikely to stop discussion among those familiar with Chen’s case.

Visit link:
Blog: Blind lawyer spurs news blackout in China

New York, April 13, 2012–Chinese authorities should halt
their censorship of Web content in the aftermath of senior politician Bo
Xilai’s dismissal, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today. Internet
officials in China have deleted at least 210,000 online posts and shut down as many as 42 websites since mid-March for allegedly spreading rumors, the state-run news agency Xinhua reported
on Thursday.

Go here to see the original:
Chinese Internet crackdown on Bo Xilai rumors continues

CPJ’s 2012 Impunity Index spotlights countries
where journalists are slain and killers go free

The rest is here:
Getting Away With Murder

Beijing-based blogger Woeser reported on her website Invisible Tibet today that she has been confined to her residence by Beijing public security officers who are stationed outside her home. Woeser, an outspoken critic of Chinese government policies in Tibet, has recently written about a series of recent self-immolations among monks and arrests
of writers in western China.

Technology has democratized news publishing, rattling regimes that see their survival dependent on control of information. Video footage of repression from Burma to Syria to Egypt dramatically illustrates the benefits of Internet platforms and social media. Yet the Arab uprisings of 2011 also demonstrate the urgent need for providers and users of digital tools to understand the dangers of deploying them in repressive nations. As threats to online journalists grow in scope and frequency, they also underscore CPJ’s mandate to be a truly global organization. More journalists need CPJ’s help than ever before.

Original post:
Attacks on the Press in 2011: Preface

Trade and the Internet are turning us into global citizens, but the news we need to ensure accountability is often stopped at national borders. China is ramping up censorship, Iran is jailing dozens of journalists, and Turkey is using nationalist laws to stifle critical reporting. In Mexico criminals are dictating the news, while in Pakistan shadowy agents are attacking investigative reporters. Attacks on the Press analyzes press conditions and documents new dangers in dozens of countries worldwide.

Visit link:
Attacks on the Press in 2011

How does one negotiate the choice to stay and report potentially dangerous news, rather than take a less risky assignment, leave the profession, or flee the country? The recipients of the 2011 International Press Freedom Awards explain. By Kristin Jones

Originally posted here:
Attacks on the Press in 2011: Profiles in Freedom

The global rate of unpunished murders remains stubbornly high at just below 90 percent. Senior officials in the most dangerous countries are finally acknowledging the problem — the first step in what will be a long, hard battle. By Elisabeth Witchel

View original post here:
Attacks on the Press in 2011: Fighting Impunity

Legislation for Internet security can quickly turn into a weapon against the free press. Cybercrime laws are intended to extend existing penal codes to the online world, but they can easily be broadened to criminalize standard journalistic practices. By Danny O’Brien

Follow this link:
Attacks on the Press in 2011: Regulating the Internet

Even as trade and new systems of communication turn us into global citizens, the information we need to ensure accountability often stops at national borders. New platforms like social media are valuable tools, but the battle against censorship is hardly over. By Joel Simon

Excerpt from:
Attacks on the Press in 2011: The Global Citizen

The much-publicized assault on Lara Logan put the danger of sexual violence for journalists into the spotlight for the first time. As a result, there is more open discussion between reporters and news managers, but still too few preventative steps. By Lauren Wolfe

View post:
Attacks on the Press in 2011: The Changing Views on Sexual Assault

The danger of covering violent street protests has become a significant risk for journalists, alongside combat and targeted killings. Sexual assault, organized crime, and digital vulnerability are also hazards. The security industry is struggling to keep up. By Frank Smyth

See the article here:
Attacks on the Press in 2011: Evolution in Journalist Security

Analyses and data chart press freedom conditions throughout the region. Mohamed Keita examines the false choice between development and press freedom, while Tom Rhodes probes an unsolved murder in Kenya that reverberates worldwide.

Follow this link:
Attacks on the Press in 2011: Africa

The Mexican president promised to protect a besieged press corps with a federal protection program, a special prosecutor and new legislation making anti-press violence a federal crime. But Felipe Calderón Hinojosa has failed at nearly every turn. By Mike O’Connor

Original post:
Attacks on the Press in 2011: In Mexico, Silence or Death Remains the Choice

In some Latin American countries, state-owned media are used not only for propaganda but as platforms to smear critics, including journalists. Some elected leaders have even invested in large multimedia holdings to further their agendas. By Carlos Lauría

See the original post:
Attacks on the Press in 2011: State Media As Anti-Media Tool

Analyses and data chart press freedom conditions throughout the region. Carlos Lauría describes the rise of state media as a powerful propaganda tool. Mike O’Connor exposes Mexico’s failed efforts to combat deadly violence against the press.

Here is the original post:
Attacks on the Press in 2011: Americas

This video companion to Attacks on the Press recounts the story of Mexican journalist Javier Valdez Cárdenas, who works in one of the world’s most dangerous places. (3:26)

Read the Attacks on the Press 2011 country profile on Mexico.

View original post here:
Attacks on the Press in 2011: Working in Peril

New York, February 16, 2012–The Committee to Protect Journalists is deeply saddened by the death of New York Times foreign correspondent Anthony Shadid, a towering figure in international crisis reporting. Shadid perished following an apparent asthma attack while on assignment in Syria.

Continued here:
CPJ mourns the death of journalist Anthony Shadid

View post:
CPJ urges Kazakhstan to stop repressing media

The Russian blogosphere erupted with comments today following an announcement
that the board of directors of the iconic radio station, Ekho Moskvy, will be changed. The timing of the development–weeks before presidential elections–and the potential consequences for Ekho’s editorial policy threw listeners into a frenzy of worry and speculation.

Original post:
Blog: Ekho Moskvy board shuffled ahead of Russian election

Last
week, Twitter provoked a fierce debate online when it announced a new capability–and related policy–to hide tweets on a country-specific basis. By building this feature into its website’s basic code, Twitter said it hoped to offer a more tailored response to legal demands to remove tweets globally. The company will inform users if any tweet they see has been obscured, and provide a record of all demands to remove content with the U.S.-based site chillingeffects.org.

View original post here:
CPJ Internet Channel: Can selective blocking pre-empt wider censorship?

New York, January 17, 2012–Unidentified gunmen killed broadcast journalist Mukarram Khan Aatif in a mosque north of Peshawar today, according to news reports. Aatif was a correspondent for private TV station Dunya News and also worked for Deewa Radio, a Pashto-language channel of the U.S. government-funded broadcaster Voice of America, news reports said.

Visit link:
Gunmen kill Pakistani journalist who reported on Taliban

New
York, January 13, 2012–The decision of prominent Chinese writer Yu Jie to seek exile in the United States this week is an indication of the intensifying hardships that face dissidents who criticize Communist Party rule, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today.

Excerpt from:
Under pressure at home, Chinese writer chooses exile

New York, January 13, 2012–The Committee to Protect Journalists condemns Thursday’s attack in Moscow on Dododzhon Atovulloyev, exiled publisher and editor-in-chief of the Tajik pro-opposition newspaper Charogi Ruz.

The rest is here:
In Russia, unknown attacker stabs exiled Tajik journalist

Last week, President Obama signed into law a bill that expands sanctions against Belarus, whose authoritarian leader Aleksandr Lukashenko continues to imprison his opponents and critics. Lukashenko unleashed the latest crackdown hours after the flawed December 2010 presidential vote, which declared him winner of a fourth term. Repression in Belarus is ongoing. Last week, authorities further tightened their grip on the media by restricting access to blacklisted websites. On Monday, a district court in Minsk jailed an independent reporter for filming a one-man protest vigil in front of the KGB headquarters.

See the article here:
Blog: What US can’t accept in Belarus, it supports in Uzbekistan

The rest is here:
In Ethiopia, Swedish journalists handed prison terms

New York, December 23, 2011 — The Committee to Protect Journalists condemns China’s harsh sentencing of online journalist and activist Chen Wei, who was handed a nine-year prison term on Friday for “inciting
subversion.”

Excerpt from:
Chinese writer-dissident given nine years for online posts

In the next three months, users of China’s microblog weibo.com — “weibo” is the generic Chinese term for Twitter-like platforms — run by the huge sina.com (the English site is here) news portal, entertainment and blogging site, will have to start providing their real-world identities to the site, instead of simply being able to register. It seems likely the users of competitor tencent.com (English here) will have to do the same, though the government
hasn’t made that clear in recent announcements, dating back to December 16.

See the article here:
Blog: In China, real people vs. Internet minders

New York,
December 15, 2011–Today’s murder of Gadzhimurad Kamalov, founder of the independent newspaper Chernovik in the southern Russian republic of Dagestan today is a lethal blow to press freedom, said the Committee to Protect Journalists.

Here is the original post:
Killing of Chernovik founder in Dagestan must be investigated

Oleg Kashin, a correspondent for the Russian business daily Kommersant, by his home on a central Moscow street, a 10-minute walk from the Kremlin. The two had
hidden steel rods in bouquets of flowers.

Visit link:
Blog: Impunity still reigns in beating of Oleg Kashin

New York, October 31, 2011–The Committee to Protect Journalists condemns the imprisonment of two Tibetan writers, one of whom was sentenced after a year of detention without trial, according to reports.

View post:
Tibetan writers imprisoned in China

Reporters Sans Frontières (RSF) announced that the media freedom NGO will pay close attention to the trial of Swedish journalists Martin Schibbye and Johan Persson , which is due to begin in Addis Ababa. Arrested on 1 July after illegally entering the southeastern Ogaden region from Somalia, they are charged with terrorist activities and violating Ethiopia’s immigration laws.

View post:
Ethiopia – Outcome already decided in trial of Swedish journalists?

BBG Watch –Several years ago, the Ethiopian regime charged in absentia Voice of America Horn of Africa Service journalists working in Washington with treason and threatened them with the death penalty. These charges were later dropped after protests from the State Department and human rights organizations. Yet despite this earlier move against VOA journalists by the Ethiopian regime, three BBG members — Michael Meehan, Susan McCue, and Dana Perino — had decided to go to Ethiopia earlier this year to negotiate placement of VOA health programs on the regime-controlled local radio networks. They also discussed media freedom issues with the Ethiopian officials, apparently without any success. The Ethiopian American media reported that the BBG members were given a list of names of dissidents and other human rights activists whose participation in VOA programs the regime views as objectionable.

Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) –

If you pass by Kronoberg Prison in Sweden’s capital, Stockholm, you will see journalists chained to its gates. They have committed no crime. For over a week, journalists have taken turns locking themselves up in front of the prison to raise awareness of the imprisonment of three colleagues held in the Horn of Africa.

Excerpt from:
Blog: Swedish support for jailed colleagues in Ethiopia, Eritrea

BBG Watch — Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) member Michael P. Meehan said at the BBG open meeting on September 15 that he had nothing to do with censoring of Voice of America news broadcasts to Ethiopia after his talks with the Ethiopian regime officials. Referring apparently to the two other BBG members who went with him on the trip, Dana Perino and Susan McCue, Meehan said that “we were disturbed by some activity” (presumably, VOA news reporting) that followed the BBG negotiations with the repressive regime in Ethiopia, but he implied that any actions that were taken, including the subsequent removal of the Voice of America Horn of Africa service chief, were taken by the VOA management. He described these actions as “appropriate.”

Link to YouTube video.

Link to BBG Watch report BBG’s Michael Meehan: charges of censorship against me are unfair

BBG Watch — Press freedom advocates and Ethiopian Americans are declaring a partial victory in their fight with the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), a U.S. government agency, over the censorship of the Voice of America radio programs to Ethiopia. They credit massive protests and a demonstration held Monday in front of the BBG and VOA headquarters in Washington, DC with getting a senior Voice of America official to tell the journalists working for the Horn of Africa VOA Service “to continue their work without any restrictions or self-censorship,” the Ethiopian American news website Addis Voice reported.

David Arnold, however, has not been returned to his old job as the VOA Horn of Africa Service chief.

Link to Partial Victory Declared in Fight Over Censorship at Voice of America

Read more from the original source:
Swedish journalists on trial in Ethiopia — Voice of America journalists already penalized

If you pass by Kronoberg Prison in Sweden’s capital, Stockholm, you will see journalists chained to its gates. They have committed no crime. For over a week, journalists have taken turns locking themselves up in front of the prison to raise awareness of the imprisonment of three colleagues held in the Horn of Africa.

Excerpt from:
Blog: Swedish support for jailed colleagues in Ethiopia, Eritrea