13 Apr 2010 | Index Index, minipost, Uncategorized
Two Tibetan students studying at the Northwest National Minorities’ University in Lanzhou, Gansu Province, were arrested by Chinese authorities last week. Police raided the rooms of Tashi Rabten (pen name Te’urang) and Druklo (pen name Shokjang), searching their personal possessions and confiscating their mobile phones, laptops and books. Tashi Rabten, editor of the banned literary magazine Shar Dungri (Eastern Snow Mountain), had previously been arrested in June 2009 for editing a collection of political essays called Written in Blood.
13 Apr 2010 | Index Index, minipost
On 7 April, Edgar Astudillo Vásquez, radio producer of a news program on Radio Panzenú, received a a pamphlet that said he would be killed before April 20 in any street in his home city of Montería in the Córdoba region. The death threats came the “Los Paisas paramilitary group. Since the murder of the radio journalist Clodomiro Castilla, on 19 March, three journalists in Montería have been threatened.
13 Apr 2010 | Index Index, minipost, Uncategorized
A Japanese cameraman for Reuters, Hiro Muramoto, was fatally shot in the chest whilst covering protests in Bangkok on 10 April. It is not apparent which side was responsible for the shooting, as Thai police used rubber bullets, tear gas and fired live ammunition into the air, whilst red shirt protesters were also accused of firing live rounds and grenades. The Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs have issued a statement calling for an independent investigation of Muramoto’s death.
13 Apr 2010 | Index Index, minipost, Uncategorized
The Spanish National Court has acquitted five executives of a now-defunct Basque-language newspaper, including its former editor-in-chief Martxelo Otamendi, of belonging to the separatist group ETA. The court said the prosecution had not provided enough evidence to support its case, which centred on economic ties between the daily Egunkaria and the proscribed terrorist organisation. The paper was shut down on a judge’s order in 2003 on the grounds that it assisted ETA. Following the closure of Egin in 1998, Egunkaria was the world’s only Basque-language newspaper.
