Index on Censorship announces shortlist for 2021 Freedom of Expression Awards

5 Jul 2021 | Algeria, Awards, Brazil, Burma, Djibouti, Egypt, Fellowship 2021, Kyrgyzstan, News and features, Nicaragua, Niger, Press Releases, Russia

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]Index on Censorship has today (5 July) revealed the shortlisted candidates for the charity’s 2021 Freedom of Expression Awards. The winners will be announced at the annual Freedom of Expression Awards Gala on 12 September 2021, and this year’s awards are particularly significant as the charity marks its fiftieth year defending freedom of expression around the globe.

Index on Censorship chief executive Ruth Smeeth said:

“As Index begins to mark its 50th birthday it’s clear that the battle to guarantee free expression and free expression around the globe has never been more relevant.  As ever we are in awe of the immense bravery of our award nominees as they stand firm, demanding their rights under repressive regimes. They are inspirational and it is our privilege to help tell their stories.”

The Freedom of Expression Awards, which were first held in 2000, celebrate individuals or groups who have had a significant impact fighting censorship anywhere in the world. Index on Censorship believes that everyone should be free to express themselves without fear of harm or persecution, and aim to raise awareness about threats to free expression and the importance of free speech.

Trevor Philips, Chair of the Index on Censorship Board of Trustees says:

“It’s been half a century since Index declared itself a voice for the persecuted. Today, the opponents of freedom are more numerous and more determined than ever to suppress opponents of the powerful. There is more need than ever to campaign for a diversity of voices to be heard. Our awards are just one candle in the growing gale of repression, and it is humbling to be able to back those who keep the flame of free expression alight.”

Awards will be presented in three categories: campaigning, arts, and journalism. This year’s panel of judges includes Afghan-born Pakistani poet and writer Fatima Bhutto, renowned sculptor Anish Kapoor, and feminist and LGBT activist and academic Ailbhe Smyth.

The shortlisted candidates for the Art award include Russian feminist performance artist Daria Apakhonchich, Brazilian film director Émerson Maranhão and Tatyana Zelenskaya, who is an illustrator based in Kyrgyzstan.

The Campaigning shortlist features feminist blogger and podcaster Nandar from Myanmar, Algerian human rights defender and LGBTQ activist Anouar Rahmani, and imprisoned Egyptian human rights activist Abdelrahman “Moka” Tarek.

Finally, the shortlisted candidates for the Journalism award include human rights activist and journalist Kadar Abdi Ibrahim from Djibouti, co-owner of the Nicaraguan independent media outlet 100% Noticias, Veronica Chavez, and Nigerien blogger Samira Sabou who was arrested in 2020 and charged with defamation under a restrictive 2019 cybercrime law.

Art
Daria Apakhonchich
Daria Apakhonchich is a performance artist from Russia, who focuses mainly on women’s rights and artistic freedom. Among other things, she has participated in a performance art piece called ‘Vulva Ballet’ and designed an artistic lament for Anastasia Yeshchenko, who was murdered by her partner in 2019. In December 2020, Apakhonchich became one of the first artists labelled a ‘foreign agent’ by Russian authorities. She was arrested in January 2021 and is now required to add a disclaimer to all social media posts identifying her as a foreign agent.

Émerson Maranhão
Émerson Maranhão is a film director from Brazil, who focuses mainly on LGBTQ+ visibility. His documentary Those Two (2018) follows the lives of two trans men. In 2019 President Jair Bolsonaro moved to cancel funding for movies with LGBTQ+ themes. Bolsonaro explicitly referred to Maranháo’s screenplay Transversais when defending the move. Funding was later reinstated, but members of the LGBT community and their allies continue to face discrimination in Brazil.

Tatyana Zelenskaya
Tatyana Zelenskaya is an illustrator from Kyrgyzstan, working on freedom of expression and women’s rights projects. Zelenskaya has found inspiration for her work in the waves of anti-government protests that have recently erupted across Russia and Kyrgyzstan. In 2020, she created the artwork for a narrative video game called Swallows: Spring in Bishkek, which features a woman who helps her friend that was abducted and forced into an unwanted marriage. The game was downloaded more than 70,000 times in its first month. Its purpose is to break the silence around the issue of bride-kidnapping in Kyrgyzstan, with the aim of preventing them altogether.

Journalism
Kadar Abdi Ibrahim
Kadar Abdi Ibrahim is a human rights activist and journalist from Djibouti. As an outspoken human rights activist, journalist and blogger, Abdi Ibrahim has been a frequent target of the regime. Kadar Abdi served as co-director and chief editor of L’Aurore, Djibouti’s only privately-owned media outlet, before it was banned in 2016. In April 2018, after returning from Geneva, where he carried out advocacy activities in preparation for Djibouti’s Universal Periodic Review (UPR), intelligence services raided Kadar Abdi’s house and confiscated his passport. He has been unable to leave the country since then. In March 2020, he was named ‘Human Rights Defender of the Month’ by Defend the Defenders.

Verónica Chávez
Verónica Chávez is the co-owner of 100% Noticias, an online Nicaraguan media outlet dedicated to providing critical journalism. In 2018, police raided the offices of 100% Noticias and arrested Chávez, her husband journalist Miguel Mora and news director Lucia Pineda. Chávez was released, but Mora and Pineda were charged and imprisoned for a year. Despite the intense repression, Chávez continued to run 100% Noticias during that time. In October 2020, Chávez was violently attacked by members of paramilitary groups close to the government, and was left in intensive care. She subsequently saw an outpouring of support, including from the Inter American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), which condemned the attack.

Samira Sabou
Samira Sabou is a Nigerien journalist, blogger and president of the Niger Bloggers for Active Citizenship Association (ABCA). In June 2020, Sabou was arrested and charged with defamation under the restrictive 2019 cybercrime law in connection with a comment on her Facebook post highlighting corruption. She spent over a month in detention. Through her work with ABCA, she conducts training sessions on disseminating information on social media based on journalistic ethics. The aim is to give bloggers the means to avoid jail time. Sabou is also active in promoting girls’ and women’s right to freedom of expression.

Campaigning
Nandar
Nandar is a feminist advocate, translator, storyteller from Myanmar. She is the creator of two podcasts: Feminist Talks and G-Taw Zagar Wyne. She founded the Purple Feminists Group and co-directed a production of The Vagina Monologues in Yangon. Building upon her experience as a woman in Myanmar, Nandar now uses her podcasts to tackle taboo topics in the country such as menstruation and abortion. In 2020, Nandar was named on the BBC’s list of 100 most influential and inspirational women around the world. She continues to speak up for justice and equality both from personal and political spheres.

Anouar Rahmani
Anouar Rahmani is a human rights defender, campaigner and writer from Algeria. He advocates for freedom of expression, the rights of minorities, and LGBTQ+ rights in Algeria. He is the first Algerian activist who has publicly called for same-sex marriage to be legally recognised in the country. Rahmani has received death threats and persecution due to his work. In 2017 he was questioned by police for “insulting God” in his novel the City of White Shadows. In 2020, Rahmani was convicted of “insulting state officials” in social media posts and ordered to pay a fine of 50,000 Dinar (£290). Rahmani believes that he is being criminalised in retaliation for his work defending freedom of expression and LGBTQ+ rights in Algeria.

Abdelrahman Tarek
Abdelrahman “Moka” Tarek is a human rights defender from Egypt, who focuses on defending the right to freedom of expression and the rights of prisoners. Tarek has experienced frequent harassment from Egyptian authorities as a result of his work. He has spent longer periods of time in prison and has experienced torture and solitary confinement. Authorities have severely restricted his ability to communicate with his lawyer and family. Tarek was arrested again in September 2020 and in December 2020, a new case was brought against him on terrorism-related charges. Tarek began a hunger strike in protest of the terrorism charges. In January 2021, he was transferred to the prison hospital due to a deterioration in his health caused by the hunger strike. As of July 2021, he remains in prison.

Notes to editors:

For more information on the awards, please contact Leah Cross, [email protected]
For any press-related queries, please contact Luke Holland, [email protected][/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]

Myanmar keeps it poets locked up despite prisoner release

2 Jul 2021 | Burma, News and features

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_single_image image=”117025″ img_size=”full” add_caption=”yes”][vc_column_text]Myanmar’s military authorities this week began to release more than 2,000 people who had been jailed as part of the protests against the country’s military coup in February. Those released included journalists, actors and other celebrities.

Military spokesman Zaw Min Tun said earlier this week that around 2,300 people were being released.

“They took part in protests but not in leading roles. They didn’t participate in violent acts,” he told the news website Irrawaddy.

Myanmar’s Assistance Association for Political Prisoners (AAPP) said in a statement: “The junta detained innocents. Torture is used as policy by this military, detainees will suffer long-term physical and mental illness. There was no recognition of the injustice and suffering caused today, and no mention of the right to compensation.”

“They are arresting people who should never have been detained in the first place, those released will be threatened and suffer from trauma. They will need rehabilitation and understanding of the injustice they experienced”, said AAPP joint secretary U Bo Kyi. “Any release must aim at real reform, including the release of Aung Sun Suu Kyi. Violence must end, and those who committed torture and murder brought to justice.”

Poets in Myanmar in 2018 before the current horrors. Maung Yu Py is far right, laughing

Not everyone detained following the coup is so lucky and the country’s poets are suffering at the military’s hands more than most.

In the summer issue of Index on Censorship magazine, out later this month, we publish the poems of K Za Win and Khet Thi, who have both died at the hands of Myanmar’s military in recent months.

Other poets’ lives have been spared but they remain in jail despite the prisoner release.

Maung Yu Py, a household name in contemporary Burmese poetry, was arrested at a protest in his hometown of Myeik on 9 March. Two months later, he was sentenced to two years in Myeik prison for “making statements conducing to public mischief” where he remains today.

Fellow poet Ko Ko Thett has translated his work “A poem for real” into English for Index. We call for Maung Yu Py’s release.

—

A poem for real  

By Maung Yu Py

Only those

backed up by strongboxes

make love after love after love.

As for me,

I am with a token of a girlfriend.

Having to endure life is real.

I don’t know why

I am Charlie Chaplinette over and over again.

Lest someone should thieve,

the plastic cup is chained

to the charity water tap,

exactly the kind of installation art

the age demands.

This year too

Asia’s social-realism trophy

we will win.

Every time I sit down for a poem

I’ve gotta get up for a dog’s yelp.

Translated by ko ko thett

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Fourteen organisations call for the immediate and unconditional release of journalist and human rights defender Andrei Aliaksandrau

2 Jul 2021 | Belarus, Media Freedom, News and features

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_single_image image=”117020″ img_size=”full”][vc_column_text]Index on Censorship and 13 other human rights, freedom of expression, media freedom, and journalists’ organisations unreservedly condemn the arbitrary detention and judicial harassment of human rights defender and journalist Andrei Aliaksandrau, who is now facing up to 15 years in prison on baseless charges of “treason to the state”.

Aliaksandrau has long been a defender of freedom of expression in Belarus and beyond, having previously held positions at the Belarusian Association of Journalists, Index on Censorship, and Article 19 among other media and free speech organisations.

Aliaksandrau was detained in January 2021. The Investigative Committee, Belarus’s criminal investigation service, indicted him on public order offences, for which he was facing up to three years in prison. The charges stem from allegations that Aliaksandrau paid the fines of journalists and protesters whom authorities detained during last year’s pro-democracy protests, triggered by the highly disputed August 2020 presidential election. The Belarusian Investigative Committee and other law enforcement agencies wrongly equated this with financing unlawful protests.

On 30 June, Belapan reported that Aliaksandrau has now been charged with “treason to the state” based on the same set of allegations. 

“More than €530,000 worth of fines were imposed on protesters between 9 August and the end of 2020. It is absurd to conflate efforts to help pay those fines with a public order offense, let alone treason,” the organisations said. 

“Belarusian authorities created a new mark of tyranny by laying treason charges against Aliaksandrou. While we urge the release of all 529 political prisoners currently detained in Belarus, which include at least 15 journalists, we are at this point in time expressing special concern for Aliaksandrau. To date, he is the only detainee facing the fabricated charge of treason.”

“Aliaksandrau has already spent 172 days in prison for his alleged ‘crime’. We call for his immediate and unconditional release,” the organisations said.

Signed by:

Article 19

Belarusian Association of Journalists (BAJ)

East European Democratic Centre (EEDC) 

European Centre for Press and Media Freedom

European Federation of Journalists (EFJ)

Free Press Unlimited (FPU)

Human Rights House Foundation (HRHF)

Human Rights Watch

IFEX

Index on Censorship

International Media Support (IMS)

PEN America

Reporters Without Borders (RSF)

South East Europe Media Organisation (SEEMO)[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]

Belarus: Journalist Andrei Aliaksandrau faces up to 15 years in prison

1 Jul 2021 | Belarus, News and features

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In a shocking development, Belarusian journalist and former Index on Censorship staff member Andrei Aliaksandrau has been charged with treason. Detained on 12 January with his partner Irina Zlobina, Andrei was originally accused of organising actions that grossly violate public order. He was due for release later this month. The new charge marks an escalation in Belarus’s draconian crackdown on press freedom and human rights activism. Andrei now faces up to 15 years in prison.

For Index on Censorship, all victims of human rights abuse are cause for concern when their right to speak out is denied, their right to freedom of expression at risk and their liberty unjustly curtailed. The excessive and groundless charges against Andrei bring the injustice faced by thousands of Belarusian journalists painfully home. For Andrei was also a key part of Index’s team in London from 2012 to 2014, bringing his expertise, his insights and his great sense of irony to the publication’s coverage of Belarus and the region. He also embraced British culture, loving pubs and beer and Liverpool FC. He is part of the Index family.

Andrei returned to Belarus after some years working in the UK out of commitment to his country and faith that a democratic future is possible. It was an act of courage, but he has never lost his sense of humour or the habit of downplaying the danger he faces.

After the sham elections in 2020, a former colleague at Index (and Everton fan) messaged him to see if he was all right. He replied: “This got to be the year Liverpool finally won the Premier League! I knew it was going to be a hell of a year.”

In the months before his detention he was working as a media manager and trainer with DW Akademie. He was previously deputy director of the Belarusian Private News Agency (Belapan). Following Andrei’s arrest, officers from the Department for Combating Economic Crimes of the Ministry of Internal Affairs searched Belapan’s office and confiscated computer hard drives along with other material.

The treatment of Andrei is a violation of his fundamental rights under the International Covenant of Civil and Political Rights, ratified by Belarus in 1973.

Andrei’s former colleagues are devastated by the news of the charges against him and will fight for his release as an act of solidarity. He was part of the UK’s human rights community – working for Index’s sister organisation Article 19 as well during his time in London. It is often the individual stories of repression and victimisation that move people to action. His unjust imprisonment must be a focus for activists, politicians and the government in the fight for long overdue democracy in Belarus.

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