21 Apr 2011 | Index Index, Middle East and North Africa, minipost
Iranian journalist Nazanin Khosravani was sentenced to six years in jail on 19 April after being convicted of impinging on national security and conducting propaganda against the regime. She was arrested in November 2009 and had her computer and personal belongings confiscated. She was later released on a $600,000 bail last March. Activists argue that her sentence is part of a general crackdown against journalists who were highly critical of the government in the 2009 presidential elections.
21 Apr 2011 | Index Index, minipost
A journalist received a written warning over an article in which he questioned the Belarussian authorities’ claims to have arrested those responsible for April’s Minsk metro bombing. A prosecutor in Belarus’s eastern district issued a letter which also warns Nyarouny not to publish similar articles in the future.
21 Apr 2011 | Index Index, Middle East and North Africa, minipost
ASwiss television channel claimed on 18 April that two of its reporters were detained without charge in Qatar for 13 days. The RTS network alleges that the pair were in the country to shoot a documentary about Qatar hosting the World Cup in 2022. The two, a journalist and a cameraman, were allowed to return to Switzerland on Friday (15 April) after paying a court ordered fine.
21 Apr 2011 | Index Index, Middle East and North Africa, minipost
Six men raided the office of a news website, Al-Muharrir, in Amman on 19 April. Unidentified men broke into the personal office of editor-in-chief Jihad Abu Baidar and threatened to kill him if he did not withdraw a report criticising the country’s Anti-Corruption Commission. Baidar subsequently filed a police complaint. A number of journalists staged a sit-in at the Jordan Press Association premises to protest the incident.
