He was the only person fighting against corruption in our law enforcement … to the police, he was public enemy number one. Askarov’s editor, Abdumomun Mamaraimov The campaigning journalist and human rights advocate, Azimjon Askarov, is Kyrgyzstan’s most famous prisoner; he is also a victim of the judicial corruption that he investigates. In September 2010,…
Morocco: Freedom of expression continues to erode as independent newspaper editor detained
This statement was originally published on the Vigilance for Democracy and the Civic State’s Facebook page on 29 May 2020. The undersigned Tunisian associations call upon the Moroccan authorities to release Slimane Raissouni, editor-in-chief of the independent newspaper Akhbar Al-Youm. They also call for an end to the fabrication of criminal cases used as a…
Controlling the message, attacking the messengers and a “make or break” moment for LGBTQI+ rights
COVID-19 updates The European External Action Service published a report this month which, somewhat surprisingly, showed a welcome decrease in the amount of disinformation being spread online about COVID-19. However, not so surprisingly, the report also found that pro-Kremlin sources are still disseminating false information about the virus. Currently, disinformation seems to be focused on:…
PEN Malaysia denounces increased use of Section 233 of the Communications and Multimedia Act 1998
This statement was originally published on pen-international.org on 27 May 2020. PEN Malaysia, a chapter of the worldwide association of writers, PEN International, denounces the increased use of Section 233 of the Communications and Multimedia Act (CMA) in recent weeks to target writers and members of the public for expressing their views on social media…
Surge in harassment of Indian reporters over coronavirus coverage
This statement was originally published on rsf.org on 27 May 2020. After logging an alarming total of 15 cases of police and judicial harassment of Indian journalists in the past four weeks, mainly in connection with their coronavirus coverage, Reporters Without Borders (RSF) calls on the supreme court to remind the governments of India’s various…
Two journalists detained on anti-state charges in Vietnam
This statement was originally published on cpj.org on 26 May 2020. Vietnam should immediately release journalists Nguyen Tuong Thuy and Pham Chi Thanh, and drop all charges against them, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today.On May 21, authorities arrested Thanh, a freelance journalist who blogs under the pseudonym Pham Thanh, at his home in…
Trump lashes out against Twitter fact check
This statement was originally published on pen.org on 27 May 2020. In response to President Trump’s threats to shut down Twitter over its fact-check of his false tweets, PEN America CEO Suzanne Nossel said the following: “President Trump’s threat to regulate or shut down social media platforms sounds a red alert for all Americans who…
State laws criminalizing protest on the rise
This statement was originally published on pen.org on 27 May 2020. In a new policy paper, Arresting Dissent: Legislative Restrictions on the Right to Protest, PEN America finds that the resurgence in recent years of public protest in the U.S. has been accompanied by a new wave of attacks on protest rights in the form…