5 Apr 2012 | Index Index, minipost
Police beat 30 demonstrators whilst they were detained at a police station in Jordan on 31 March. The demonstrators were arrested after gathering near the Prime Minister’s office in Amman, protesting the detention of seven activists from Tafila who were arrested mid-March. The 100 strong group of protesters were warned by police after some began chanting “if the people are scorned, the regime will fall.” The crowd were violently dispersed and beaten with truncheons by the police, and 30 participants were arrested. After being taken to the Central Amman Police station, officers continued to kick, punch and beat those who had been arrested.
5 Apr 2012 | Russia
Journalists and photographers gathered near the Uzbekistan embassy in Moscow to protest against the deportation of their colleague Victoria Ivleva and Uzbekistan authorities’ policy towards foreign journalists.
Ivleva, a photojournalist for Novaya Gazeta, was deported from Uzbekistan without explanation on 23 March. She arrived in the country’s capital Tashkent to hold free training courses for her Uzbek colleagues, but was refused permission to enter the country or contact Russian officials and then was put on a flight back to Russia.
Ivleva speculates that she was refused entry because the training was being organised by Umida Akhmedova — a notable local photographer who was charged on “insult and libel against Uzbek nation” after creating a documentary dedicated to women’s rights in Uzbekistan in 2010. But her expulsion could also be due to an article she wrote six years ago. Entitled The Country of Fish the article describes how Uzbek people were humiliated and silenced by the authorities.
Ivleva’s colleagues waited until the beginning of April to hold a protest sanctioned by Moscow’s authorities. They gathered in Uzbek national clothes, with placards saying “A man with a camera is no enemy to the state” and other slogans. They told journalists that people of two countries, that once were fellow citizens, “should not suffer from deportations”.
Uzbek embassy staff did not come out of the building to meet the protesters, but were seen videoing them through the window.
As one of the protesters, Daniil Kislov editor-in-chief of Fergana online media, told journalists that since 2005 Uzbek authorities have banished reporters from all the leading agencies, making the country a “burnt information field”.
5 Apr 2012 | Middle East and North Africa
Journalist Yousef Al Shayeb, detained by the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank town of Ramallah, was released on bail on Monday “pending investigation” after eight days of incarceration. Al Shayeb began a hunger strike “in the name of press freedom” three days in, after a court renewed his detention order for a further 15 days. His release is seen as being due to the success of his fellow journalists in publicising the case, especially following fresh efforts by the Attorney General to prevent his release on Tuesday.
Al Shayeb is accused of “slander and defamation” and was held while the authorities “searched for evidence” to support the charges brought against him. These accusations came from two government officials: the Foreign Minister Riyad Malki and the head of the Palestinian Diplomatic Mission to France. A conviction for defamation of a public official could result in Al Shayeb imprisonment for two years, and the damages sought by the Minister and the Head of the Mission total 6 million USD.
It is the circumstances surrounding Al Shayeb’s incarceration that present increasingly damning evidence against the Palestinian Authority, who have targeted Al Shayeb and his employer, the Jordanian Al Ghad newspaper, following a story he published in January. The article in question “accused Palestinian Authority deputy ambassador Safwat Ibraghit in Paris of recruiting Arab students to spy on Islamic groups in France and abroad, and sharing that information with both Palestinian and foreign intelligence agencies,” according to the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), who proclaimed their outrage in a report on Wednesday. The article also accused the Director of the Palestinian National Fund Abu Nabil, the head of the Palestinian Diplomatic Mission Hael al-Fahoum of corruptly promoting Ibraghit to his post, and the Foreign Minister Riyad Malki of covering up the entire scandal.
According to the CPJ as well as local media sources, the Palestinian Authority also pressured Al Ghad, resulting in them firing Al Shayeb shortly after he was first questioned in January; he had worked for the paper for a decade. Al Shayeb has also come under pressure to reveal his sources, but has maintained his journalistic right to protect them following his initial arrest and questioning in January. The Palestinian Centre for Development and Media Freedoms has stressed that under Palestinian law, no journalist is required to reveal their sources unless the subject is considered a matter “of national security” or they are required to do so by a court order.
In an effort to correct the negative reports written about them following Al Shayeb’s arrest and hunger strike, the Palestinian Authority have made themselves look unfamiliar with the concept of a free press. The Foreign Minister told local news agency Ma’an that journalists had reacted “emotionally” to the arrest of their colleague, and that they should be willing to hear both sides of the story, as then they would understand who the true victims were. He also maintained that Al Shayeb knowingly published “falsehoods” in the report, but failed to explain why this would be grounds for arrest and detention. On Wednesday, the cabinet issued a communiqué following its weekly meeting which stated it “continues to protect journalists’ rights to work freely”, yet also asked journalists “to maintain professional standards, particularly on public affairs issues.”
Such attitudes seem likely to further increase public dissatisfaction with the body. In a pole on the Ma’an website, an overwhelming majority of 84.9 per cent of responses responded to the question “PA detention of journalists for libel accusation is primarily a failure of?” with “The PA’s ability to tolerate criticism.” Al Shayeb’s arrest also came at the same time as the authority announced, without irony, that it would be issuing a press freedom award. Many journalists as well as the Palestinian Journalists Syndicate have subsequently said that they will boycott the award in light of recent events.
Ruth Michaelson is a freelance journalist based in Ramallah. Follow her on Twitter @_Ms_R
5 Apr 2012 | Uncategorized
On 28 March a primary court in the coastal city of Mahdia, sentenced two atheist friends, Jabeur Mejri and Ghazi Beji, to seven and a half years in prison, and to a fine of 1200 Tunisian Dinars (around USD $800) each, over the use of social networks to publish content deemed blasphemous. Mejri,and Beji were put on trial following a complaint lodged by a group of residents in Mahdia.
Private radio station Shems FM reported that Mejri and Beji published cartoons insulting the Prophet.
While Jabeur Mejri is in prison, his friend Ghazi Beji, who was sentenced in absentia, is at large. He fled to Athens to avoid prosecution. According to atheistica.com Beji wrote a book called “the Illusion of Islam”, and published it on the internet. His friend Mejri, wrote another book and “cursed the government, Islamists, Prophet Mohamed, drew a pig sleeping on the Kaaba [a sacred building for Muslims], and expressed his hatred towards Arabs and his love to Israel and its prime minister Natanyaho [sic]”.
Mejri, and Beji were convicted of “insulting others via public communication networks”, and spreading publications and writings that could “disturb public order” and “ moral transgression”.
The League of Tunisian Humanists condemned the sentence and complained about the “unclear circumstances that surrounded the trial, since one of the defendants fled”.
Olfa Riahi, a blogger and a journalist, who broke the story on the Tunisian blogosphere, told Index on Censorship that she is looking forward to see more associations getting together to support Mejri and Beji. “Many associations have started to react, but I would like to see [human rights group group] Liberty and Equity, as an association with an Islamic background, reacting too”, she said.
Bochra Bel Haji Hmida, a renowned Tunisian lawyer and women rights activist, will defend Mejri and Beji in their appeal.
Though the 2011 uprising has permitted Tunisians to freely express themselves, and criticize the political system; Islam has turned out to be a red line for the predominantly Muslim country, where censorship is taking on a religious tone.
