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Index on Censorship condemns the brutal murder of US-Bangladeshi blogger Avijit Roy. Roy, an atheist who advocated secularism, was hacked to death by a knife-wielding mob in Dhaka as he walked back from a book fair.
Index CEO Jodie Ginsberg said: “Our sympathies are with the family of Avijit Roy. Roy was targeted simply for expressing his own beliefs and we are appalled by his death and condemn all such killings.”
Bonil is the pen name for Xavier Bonilla, an Ecuador-based editorial cartoonist who draws for several national newspapers, particularly El Universo. For 30 years he has critiqued, lampooned and ruffled the feathers of Ecuador’s political leaders, earning a reputation as one of the wittiest and most fearless cartoonists in South America.
More recently, Bonil has gained a new epithet – “the pursued cartoonist” is how Spanish newspaper El Pais recently styled him. Bonil’s work had regularly attracted the ire of incumbent president Rafael Correa. But in 2014 anger escalated to retribution, the president publicly denounced Bonil and threatened him with legal action on two separate occasions – the first was successful against Bonil, and the second is ongoing.
President Correa has been in constant battle with the domestic press since first being elected in 2007. He has reprimanded journalists critical of the state through a combination of crippling fines and smear campaigns on his weekly TV show. In response to a 2012 article in El Universo calling him a dictator, he charged the paper with criminal libel – leading editors were sentenced to three years each in prison, and the paper was fined $42 million.
On that occasion, international pressure led Correa to pardon the newspaper at the 11th hour. But in June 2013 he introduced a new communications law which, under the guise of promoting freedom of expression, codified the repression of political journalism. It ordained that “information of public interest received through the media should be verified, balanced, contextualized and opportune” – meaning the government had the ultimate say on whether a journalist’s work was appropriate.
Bonil was the first individual to be targeted by the legislation. In December 2013, police raided the apartment of Fernando Villavicencio, a journalist and adviser to an opposition party, and took his computers and files. Villavicencio had claimed to own documents revealing government corruption. Correa alleged that Villavicencio had illegally hacked into government emails.
Bonil’s depiction of the incident (see below), published in El Universo the following day, took Villavicencio’s side. Correa publicly denounced the cartoon, calling Bonil “sick”, “cowardly” and “an ink assassin”. He called for an investigation which led to Bonil and El Universo being dragged before a media regulatory agency, which fined El Universo $92,000 and ordered Bonil to draw a “retraction” cartoon (also below) within three days. In this version, dripping with sarcasm, comically polite officers give a bunch of flowers to Villavicencio, who in turn begs the police to take away his belongings.
Bonil attracted further government attention when, in August 2014, he drew a cartoon ridiculing star footballer-turned-statesman Agustín “El Tin” Delgado. A viral video had showed El Tin struggling to read through a speech in parliament. Bonil’s cartoon suggested that ridicule of El Tin was justified, given his sizeable government salary. President Correa has since repeatedly denounced Bonil as racist and called the cartoon a “hate crime” – a charge which can carry a three-year prison sentence. Bonil has responded that the cartoon had no racial element.
By Thatcher Hullerman Cook (https://www.flickr.com/photos/poptech/5107260975) [CC BY-SA 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons
Grammy and Oscar-award winning American singer John Legend is set to perform in Bahrain on Monday 2 March, according to the organisers of Bahraini festival Spring Of Culture 2015.
“While sitting at his gleaming grand piano, accompanied by the subtle brilliance of four string instrumentalists and a guitarist, the 35-year-old crooner captivates his audience at the simply wonderfull (sic) intimate venue,” reads the promotional blurb on the festival’s website. And it looks to have been a popular booking, as tickets reportedly sold out in hours.
But many are unhappy with the concert going ahead, due to Bahrain’s poor human rights record. The Gulf monarchy has seen significant protests since 2011 calling for democracy and human rights, which have been cracked down on by authorities. “The government continued to stifle and punish dissent and to curtail freedoms of expression, association and assembly,” Amnesty International said of Bahrain in their recently released annual report.
Among those speaking out against the show, was prominent human rights defender Maryam Alkhawaja. Her father and sister are currently imprisoned in Bahrain on charges related to their campaigning work.
.@johnlegend ur performance in #Bahrain will b used 2 whitewash regime violations which include: systematic #torture, extrajudicial killings
.@johnlegend 10 mins frm where ull b prforming, protests will b attackd, ppl teargassd. Dont allow ur music 2 drown out their cries #Bahrain — Maryam Alkhawaja (@MARYAMALKHAWAJA) February 26, 2015
.@johnlegend song #Glory is an inspiration to everyone fighting for rights. Your integrity is at stake if you perform it in #Bahrain — BIRD (@BirdBahrain_) February 26, 2015
People should pressure signer @johnlegend who claim to love civil rights so he would cancel his trip to support AlKahlifa Moanrchy #Bahrain — Ali AlAhmed (@AliAlAhmed_en) February 26, 2015
Nabeel Rajab, another famous human rights campaigner, also reached out to Legend on Twitter. Rajab was in January sentenced over a tweet where he allegedly “denigrated government institutions”. He was today again summoned by Bahraini police, and fears he can be arrested “at any time“.
Many expressed disappointment that Legend, who on numerous occasions in recent times has spoken out on racism and injustice in his native US, would perform in Bahrain given the country’s current political situation.
As someone speaking out against incarceration in the US, shocking that @johnlegend is going to sing in Bahrain with 3000 political prisoners — Ala’a Shehabi (@alaashehabi) February 25, 2015
.@johnlegend Please don’t perform in Bahrain, John. After your Selma track, you cannot support a repressive segregationist regime like that. — AHMED HUSSAIN ☪ (@iA7med80_) February 26, 2015
It would be a fantastic statement of solidarity against oppression for @johnlegend to refuse to perform in #Bahrain. Please consider it. — Daniel Wickham (@DanielWickham93) February 25, 2015
.@johnlegend how can one of today’s most politically thoughtful artists play Bahrain with 1000s of political prisoners? Via @alaashehabi — Marc Lynch (@abuaardvark) February 25, 2015
You have emerged as a voice of conscience in today’s America. In your writing, performances and speeches you have proven yourself to be a principled champion of equality who is unafraid to speak out for what is right. Last year, you wrote that “As I watched the final version of Selma, I did so with the backdrop of the streets of many of our major cities filled with protesters, crying out for justice after yet another unarmed black person’s life was taken by the police with impunity.”Bahraini lives have been taken by the police with impunity as well, and Bahraini lives do matter. I hope that you will think deeply about the implications of performing in a country like today’s Bahrain, where the violence of an unaccountable police against peaceful protestors mirrors everything against which you have spoken out at home.
While some called for a cancellation of the show, others urged Legend to use his platform to speak out about human right abuses in Bahrain, as he has done in the US.
If @johnlegend decides 2 go thru with #Bahrain shows, he must bring the msg of “Glory” to a country with extreme human rights violations. — Kelsey Waxman (@kkwaxman) February 25, 2015
But not everybody agreed with the criticism.
The stupidity of some people is unreal. Asking John Legend not to come to Bahrain due to protests (that aren’t even important anymore) is… — Moh’d (@MohamedK62) February 26, 2015
…is just stupid. John Legend coming to Bahrain would give our economy a boost (no matter how small or big it is). — Moh’d (@MohamedK62) February 26, 2015
This isn’t the first controversial celebrity visit to Bahrain. In 2012, reality star Kim Kardashian visited the country to launch a Millions of Milkshakes store. As Index’s Sara Yasin wrote at the time: “Bahrain is no stranger to using flashy events to attempt to whitewash its tarnished international reputation.”
Update 2 March 2015, 16:28pm
John Legend has responded to the criticism, saying that “the solution to every human rights concern is not always to boycott” and that he hopes “to meet the many people who are peacefully struggling for freedom, justice and accountability, regardless of what country they live in”. Full statement below, via The Independent:
Some have recently suggested that, due to documented human rights abuses by the government of Bahrain, I should cancel my upcoming concert there. After consulting with human rights experts, I decided to keep my commitment to perform for the people of Bahrain, many of whom I am proud to call my fans, during their annual festival. I have spent quite a bit of time thinking about human rights, civil rights and other issues of justice, both in the United States and abroad. The solution to every human rights concern is not always to boycott. Most of the time I will choose to engage with the people of the country rather than ignore or abandon my commitments to perform for them. Often, the best way to drive progress is to show up and participate in the conversation. As we move this work forward, I hope to meet the many people who are peacefully struggling for freedom, justice and accountability, regardless of what country they live in, and tell them directly that I stand with them. Part of my mission in life is to spread love and joy to people all over the world. I intend to do just that in Bahrain, regardless of my disagreements with some of their governments’ policies and actions.
There is, I am told, a war going on in feminism. A war between “intersectionalists” (I think) and TERFs (Trans-Exclusionary Radical Feminists, as far as I can tell).
I am not about to stick my oar into this particular boating lake, for two reasons:
Reason 1. Self-awareness. I am a white middle class western European media professional, north-London dwelling male, born in a time when there is little chance of conscription. I am practically the most privileged thing that ever existed, and the last thing people struggling for equality need is me, turning up, cheerily shouting “Only me!!!” like Harry Enfield’s Mr-You-Don’t-want-to-do-it-like-that, and telling people how to do a real feminism. That is not to say I do not have a right to have an opinion, but…
Reason 2: lurking in that apparently placid boating lake are piranhas, reading to chew up and spit out any oarsman (or woman) who does not know every ebb and eddie of the lake.
It’s a horrible sight to see. Every so often some poor naive jumps in their little pleasure boat, having been assured by the man that it’s perfectly safe, and rows happily to the middle of the lake. You watch from the shore. They wave back. What’s that sound? They’re singing Sister Suffragette from Mary Poppins, their rowing keeping a brisk beat with the jaunty marching tune. “Shoulder-to-shoulder” and-stroke-and-stroke.
Unbeknownst to them, the piranhas have smelled blood. They row on. Gleefully, they reach the crescendo: “Our daughters’ daughters’ will adore us…”. They raise their hands to punch the air. An unattended oar slips into the water. The piranhas stir. Daughters? That sounds like determinism. The water begins to froth. The poor unsuspecting oarsman (or woman) is still singing. Eventually they catch the commotion in the corner of one eye: they hear it grow louder, under the boat, which now seems irresponsibly flimsy.
They sing still, but now in trepidation: “No more the meek and mild subservients we!”.
The frenzy grows stronger, at what was certainly a slight on members of the BDSM community (well, the Ms anyway). Stronger and stronger. Our rower tries to resist, we can see, but the boat is now falling apart, as if rotten, under their feet. Our previously carefree rower feels first a nip, and then a rush. They are simultaneously drowning and being eaten alive.
A final defiant shriek from a the near-eviscerated pleasure seeker, and then there is nothing. The waters are calm once more.
We tut, from the shore. Such a shame, such a loss. Did you see the cowbell dog?
That’s one version, but then try to see it from the fishes’ point of view. Fish have got to live. Piranhas have been, for years, maligned as a generality by the mainstream. The very word “piranha” is thrown around as an insult. Piranhas are irrational, illogical, even abominations against nature. And of course, there is more than one type of piranha, and not every piranha has the same experience of what it’s like being a piranha. Piranha identity is complex, to say the least. But that doesn’t mean piranhas shouldn’t bond together and work together. What outsiders view as a “feeding frenzy” is actually the best – only – way piranhas can continue to exist safely.
Besides, the piranhas grew up in this lake. They know it like the back of their fins – how to navigate, how to communicate. If anyone’s in a wrong place in the boating lake, it’s not the piranhas.
This is not an unreasonable case. The question then (and here’s where the horrendous tortured boating lake analogy comes to an end, you’ll be pleased to know) is: Was George Bush right? Can the human beings and the fish coexist peacefully?
The issue emerged again recently with a terse exchange of letters in the Observer newspaper, which followed the cancellation of a show by comic Kate Smurthwaite at Goldsmith’s college. Smurthwaite said she’d been banned because some university feminists who are pro sex work were threatening to protests against her anti sex work views, and the college security didn’t want the hassle.
A letter was put together, as letters are, decrying campus censorship and the narrowing of debate (with specific mention of the National Union of Students’ policy of “no-platforming” feminist Julie Bindel for statements on trans people). There was a response, disputing the facts of the first letter and suggesting that there are bigger campus free speech issues – around student protest for example – than whether certain already powerful people can take part in a panel debate or a comedy show.
The problem here is the commodification of free speech: who is allowed it and who isn’t, and, in hierarchical societies (i.e. pretty much every society we’ve come up with so far) who grabs it as theirs and who should be granted more in order to even things out, and who can “use” free speech against whom.
This is to treat free speech as a weapon rather than a space. There is not a limited amount of free speech to go round: rather, there is a (hopefully) ever-expanding free speech arena in which we can argue. The signatories of both letters have actually identified the same problem, the narrowing of the space, particularly in education. Perhaps it would be beneficial for them to defend the space in which to argue rather than trying to push the other side overboard.
Nabeel Rajab during a protest in London in September (Photo: Milana Knezevic)
Nabeel Rajab, one of Bahrain’s most prominent human rights activists, says he has again been summoned by the police. He believes he will be handed down a new charge and that he could be arrested at any time.
“Just to inform you that I was summoned today morning to attend the police station at the same time – and I came to know that the new charge against me will incitement of hatred against the regime,” Rajab, president of the Bahrain Center for Human Rights and a member of Human Rights Watch’s Middle East Advisory Board, said in an email to supporters this morning.
He said he is not planning to go to the station until after the weekend as he was informed so late, but added it is “very possible” that “they will come to arrest me at any time from home”.
“I do not know how many years I will be kept in jail this time but I am confident that people like you will always be beside me and my family,” he wrote.
Rajab has continuously been targeted by Bahraini authorities over his human rights campaigning work. On 20 January, he was sentenced to six months, suspended pending a fine, on charges stemming from a single tweet in which both the ministry of interior and the ministry of defence allege that he “denigrated government institutions”. Rajab was granted bail while he appealed the verdict in his case. Rajab was released last May after spending two years in prison on charges including writing offensive tweets and taking part in illegal protests.
An earlier version of this article stated that Rajab is the director of the Gulf Center for Human Rights. He no longer holds this post.
Rory O’Neill is a Dublin-based stand-up comedian and self-described accidental activist for gay rights, who sees his duty as “to say the unsayable”.
O’Neill had been performing a comedy drag act under the name “Panti Bliss” for more than two decades when, over the course of one conversation in January 2014, he was thrust onto an international stage. While guest-starring on the Saturday night talk show of Ireland’s premier TV channel, he made reference to observable homophobia among certain Irish news figures. Pressed for names, he identified columnists John Waters and Breda O’Brien, as well as the Iona Institute, a socially conservative Catholic think tank campaigning against gay marriage, as examples of anti-gay attitudes.
RTÉ One and O’Neill were immediately threatened with legal action for alleged defamation. The TV company issued a full apology and paid six individuals €85,000 – with €40,000 allegedly going to Waters – of public money to settle the dispute. It also edited out the offending segment of the episode on its online player. The apology prompted almost a thousand complaints to the TV station and Pantigate, as the controversy came to be called, triggered countrywide debate.
The incident was brought up in both the Irish and European parliaments amid discussions of homophobia in Europe. Paul Murphy, a Socialist Party MEP for Dublin, used parliamentary privilege to denounce O’Neill’s detractors as homophobic, and to criticise RTÉ One’s attempts at appeasement.
The voices of columnists such as Waters, who called same-sex marriage a “satire of marriage”, and O’Brien, who has said that “equality must take second place to the common good”, have become more insistent as Ireland gears up for its referendum on gay marriage in May 2015. Early poll results suggest that the majority of voters will support the resolution for equal marriage rights.
Three weeks after the RTÉ One appearance, Panti appeared after a show at the Abbey Theatre in Dublin to deliver an impassioned ten-minute speech about pervasive low-level homophobia in Ireland. The speech rapidly garnered hundreds of thousands of views on YouTube, and attracted the support of Stephen Fry and Madonna, among others. Columnist Fintan O’Toole called it “the most eloquent Irish speech since Daniel O’Connell [a 19th-century Irish political leader] was in his prime”.
O’Neill channelled the events of early 2014 into his new stand-up set High Heels in Low Places, which was highly praised in reviews for fusing incisive political commentary and down-to-earth, traditonal drag-act humour. During anecdote-based performances, O’Neill has spoken about the difficulties he faced coming out in the late ’80s in a country where homosexuality was still a criminal act, as well as the emotional turmoil of being diagnosed with HIV in the mid-90s.
O’Neill becomes Panti Bliss every Saturday night at his Dublin-based LGBT-friendly bar, PantiBar. This year he has published a memoir, called Woman in the Making, and has been named one of Rehab’s People of the Year. After a successful indiegogo campaign raised €50,000, director Conor Horgan has begun work on a film about Panti, The Queen of Ireland, to be released in 2015.
Mouad Belghouat is a Moroccan rapper and human rights activist who releases music under the moniker El Haqed, roughly translated as The Enraged. His music has publicised widespread poverty and endemic government corruption in Morocco since 2011, when his song Stop the Silence galvanised Moroccans to protest against their government. He has been imprisoned on spurious charges three times in as many years, most recently for four months in 2014.
“I have not been able to find stable work since my first sentence, so I have concentrated on music – slam and rap. I brought out an album after my
second stretch in prison and this is what led to my second conviction”, El Haqed told Index on Censorship via email.
El Haqed’s 2014 album Walou — which is banned from being sold or played in public–translates as Nothing. Nothing, he clarifies in his songs, has changed in Morocco despite promises from King Mohammed VI and the government following mass protests, starting in February 2011. The 20 February Movement, which inspired tens of thousands of Moroccans across the country to march for constitutional change, protested against the country’s lack of civil liberties and rights, high illiteracy rates, huge rich-poor divide, insufficient healthcare and illegitimate election process.
“In 2011, I found myself at the heart of the 20 February youth movement, which caused me to question a lot of things – notably poverty, power, humiliation, inequality and freedom. I reflected these things in my writing and raps, and this quickly annoyed the regime,” El Haqed wrote.
After this demonstration of widespread dissent, Mohammed VI promised a comprehensive overhaul of Morocco’s undemocratic regime. He introduced a new constitution that pledged to better safeguard Moroccans’ human rights. But despite the fanfare, the plight of El Haqed and many others in the same situation suggest that the much-touted progress has been surface-deep.
After El Haqed’s most recent arrest outside a football stadium in Casablanca, he was charged with scalping tickets, public drunkenness and assault of a police officer. He denies the allegations, and believes instead that police had been looking for an opportunity to arrest him after the release of Walou — one officer at the scene was heard to say “I have scores to settle with you”. El Haqed and his brother were beaten by police as they were detained. El Haqed has said that police tortured him during later interrogation.
During his trial, witnesses of El Haqed being assaulted by police during his arrest were not allowed to give their testimony, and key pieces of evidence were rejected by the court without reason. His lawyers withdrew in protest. During his four-month imprisonment, he continued to write music and give impromtpu performances. When guards realised that his new songs were being published outside the prison, they confiscated his lyrics and put him in solitary confinement. He went on hunger strike to protest his treatment.
El Haqed continues to record and release music — just as he did after being arrested and imprisoned in 2011 and 2012, both times on dubious grounds. In the latter case, he was sentenced to a year in prison for “insulting the police”. His song Dogs of the State, which criticised the Moroccan police, was anonymously set to a YouTube video depicting a police officer with a donkey-head. El Haqed denied any involvement.
With three convictions in three years, El Haqed faces difficulties in pursuing his recording career because studios do not want to work with him because they fear government surveillance. He is banned from performing in public and lives with the knowledge that every action is being watched.
“I was profoundly touched by my nomination as a defender of free expression. Especially as now, and after three successive periods of incarceration, it is still hard to live”, El Haqed wrote.
El Haqed hopes to create a recording studio that will be open to all Moroccans and is currently working on a new album.
With the rise of Islamic State (IS) in the Middle East, people across various platforms of social media are sharing videos of brutal killings by the terrorist organisation. This month’s #IndexDrawTheLine question is: How much is too much?
Royal Jordanian Air Force pilot Muath Al Kasasbeh was captured by IS at the end of last year, and a graphic video was shared on the internet earlier this month, which appeared to show the pilot suffering a barbarous death.
In last year’s Gaza-Israel conflict, various graphic images were shared on social media. One incident that stood out was the case of four Palestinian children who were reportedly killed by Israeli shells whilst playing on a beach. Photographs and videos depicting the dead bodies of these children were shared on various networks.
Some would argue that sharing graphic content is a means of revealing the truth, helping to raise awareness of what actually happens to the people involved in these situations and how serious the issue is. Others would say that refraining from sharing these videos would stop terrorists from achieving their goals, respect those who were killed and perhaps remember them in a different way.
With all the graphic videos and photographs shared on social media, and the wider internet, where should we draw the line? Does this differ depending on who shares the content: terrorists? passers-by? news stations?
Tweet your response to #IndexDrawtheLine to join the conversation.
Songhoy Blues is a four-strong “desert blues” band, based in Mali. It is made up of musicians who fled northern Mali after a loose assortment of militant Islamist groups captured the territory and implemented strict sharia law – including the prohibition of secular music – in spring 2012. The musicians first met at a wedding in Bamako, Mali’s capital city, and started playing together to help recreate the rich tradition of northern Malian music for the growing population of refugees in the south.
Musicians had long been important social figures in Mali. They occupied a specific, revered cultural class, called the “griots”, and their role encompassed entertainer, reporter, historian, and political commentator. Their unique power and influence explains why the invading Movement for Oneness and Jihad in West Africa, the largest of the fundamental Islamist groups, were particularly keen to block their activities in August 2012.
The official sentence for breaching the music ban was a public whipping, although Songhoy Blues’ founding member and guitarist Garba Touré was threatened with having his hand cut off if he continued playing. Radio stations were burned down, musical instruments were smashed, and there were reports of people being beaten by the occupying militia just for having polyphonic ringtones.
The Malian military stepped in to counteract the Islamist groups’ advance in February 2013, with the help of troops from France and surrounding African countries. But emotional residue from the conflict lingers, and – despite the lifting of sharia law – many musicians continue to self-censor, fearful of the Islamist groups’ return and retribution.
Garba Touré left his hometown of Diré, upstream from Timbuktu along the river Niger, once his safety in northern Mali had become untenable. He settled in Bamako, 1000km away, alongside thousands of other refugees. Here he met two more musicians from the Songhoy tribe (a North Malian ethnic group), Aliou Touré and Oumar Touré, and local drummer Nathanael Dembélé.
As a band the foursome played rough and rowdy blues-rock anthems, the lyrics of which called for an end to the conflict. Their audiences, which packed out Bamako bars and restaurants, were a mix of refugee Songhoys and Tuaregs – long-feuding northern Malian ethnic groups united against the insurgent Islamist groups.
The band joined forces with Africa Express, a group of Western singers and producers led by Damon Albarn, which had come to Bamako to work with local artists in September 2013. Songhoy Blues collaborated with Yeah Yeah Yeahs guitarist Nick Zinner on a song called Soubour (i.e. “patience” – Garba has said, “We’re asking the refugees to have patience. Without patience, nothing is possible”). This became the lead single for Maison des Jeunes, the album made during Africa Express’s Mali trip.
In 2014 Songhoy Blues went on a global tour, and also supported artists such as Damon Albarn and Julian Casablancas in tours across Europe. Mojo magazine has named them one of 10 “new faces of 2015”. Their debut album, Music In Exile, will be released in February, and its lead single – called Al Hassidi Terei and produced by Zinner – has received critical acclaim. The band are also working on a feature film about the music ban in northern Mali.
From top left: Arif Yunus, Rasul Jafarov, Leyla Yunus, Khadija Ismayilova, Intigam Aliyev and Anar Mammadli
With the arrival of the European Union special representative for human rights in Azerbaijan, the country has a unique opportunity to adhere to the international commitments it has signed by releasing detained and imprisoned journalists and human rights defenders.
“We have seen a marked deterioration in the human rights situation in Azerbaijan in recent months. A host of prominent reporters and civil society activists, who play a vital role in holding government to account, have been arrested and their voices silenced. The EU can — and should — do much more to hold Azerbaijan to account,” said Index CEO Jodie Ginsberg.
The special representative, Stavros Lambrinidis, is in the country at the invitation of the Azerbaijani government.
The visit comes as the pre-trial detention of Arif Yunus, a human rights defender, was extended an additional five months. Arrested just days after his wife, Leyla Yunus, on 5 August 2014, Arif Yunus is facing charges of state treason and fraud.
Index recommends that Lambrinidis seek a more balanced view of the human rights situation in Azerbaijan by securing meetings with both Arif and Leyla Yunus, human rights and democracy activist Rasul Jafarov, Anar Mammadli and Bashir Suleymanli, human rights lawyer Intigam Aliyev and journalists Khadija Ismayilova and Seymur Hezi. Mammadli, Suleymanli and Hezi are currently serving prison terms, while the others are in pre-trial detention. Lambrinidis should also visit the the Swiss embassy, where journalist and human rights activist Emin Huseynov has been forced to take refuge from the ongoing crackdown on civil society.
Ekho Moskvy (Echo Moscow) is an independent Russian radio station. One of few media outlets that is critical of Vladimir Putin’s regime, it is revered by many as the last bastion of free speech in the country.
Ekho was set up in 1990 by radio veterans jaded with Soviet propaganda, and has taken an interrogative stance towards Russia’s government ever since. Its focus is on maintaining balance – it airs pro and anti-Kremlin voices in equal measure. Its editor-in-chief, Alexei Venediktov, has often done battle with Putin and his government. In 2012 Putin is said to have remarked that Ekho served foreign interests, and “pour[ed] diarrhoea over me day and night”.
During the 1990s, Russia’s news outlets developed into a world-respected critical force. But since Putin came into power in 1999, the media’s role as objective watchdog has diminished, and most news organisations are now resolutely pro-Kremlin.
In 2014, Russia attracted significant international condemnation over its involvement with the Ukraine civil war. In response, Putin began to cultivate an us-versus-them atmosphere in his country which saw his popular approval ratings grow to 80 per cent. Such an atmosphere has little room for dissidence, and anti-government voices have been silenced. The remaining politically independent news outlets are gradually being banned, crippled or brought in line with the Kremlin.
“There are various theories as to how Ekho gets away with it. Some say the radio and associated website, with a following of nearly one million in Moscow and three million in the regions, is tolerated because it allows the intelligentsia to let off steam, with little impact on the rest of the TV-watching country. Others say it allows the Kremlin to argue to the world that free speech is not dead in Russia. And one theory has it that Kremlin staff themselves depend on Echo to be properly informed because they can’t rely on their own propaganda.”
Buntman has another explanation, Womack wrote. “It’s no miracle and no wonder,” he told her. “You’d be surprised but a lot actually depends on us. Many journalists just give in too soon; they give up at the first hurdle.”
Last year was especially turbulent for Ekho Moskvy, which fought Putin’s media crackdown on many fronts. Its website was banned in March by Roskomnadzor, Russia’s media watchdog, after it published a blog post by leading opposition figure Alexei Navalny. In December, the Dagestan limb of the station was shut down by Roskomnadzor for no official reason.
The outlet was issued its own warning from Roskomnadzor in October. The watchdog cited two interviews aired by Ekho with journalists who provided first-hand accounts of fighting in eastern Ukraine. Roskomnadzor said the programme contained “information justifying war crimes,” and ordered the station to take down the interview transcripts from its website. Two cautions from Roskomnadzor in a year usually leads to an organisation’s closure.
Alexander Plyushchev, who conducted the banned interviews, was fired by Ekho’s owner Gazprom-Media in November, though Venediktov would later reject the dismissal and reinstate Plyushchev. Ostensibly, Plyushchev was sacked because of an insensitive tweet he had sent about the death of the son of Putin’s chief of staff. But Venediktov has suggested that Plyushchev’s controversial interviews the month before are behind the firing by Gazprom-Media owner Mikhail Lesin, Putin’s former press minister.
Despite challenges, the station’s news coverage was commended for staying true to its spirit of independence. Reports on the fighting between pro-Russian separatists and the Ukraine government were praised for their even-handedness, at a time when the majority of Russian media took a staunchly pro-Kremlin approach. As a result, Venediktov and his colleagues have appeared on several blacklists and have been labelled “enemies of Russia”.
Peter Greste spoke to a Frontline Club audience about his arrest and detention in Egypt. (Photo: Milana Knezevic / Index on Censorship)
Peter Greste, the Al Jazeera journalist recently released after 400 days in Egyptian jail, met a packed room at London’s Frontline Club on Thursday, where he spoke about his time in jail, the campaign for his release and fellow journalists still imprisoned in Egypt. “An attack on journalism, an attack on freedom of speech, is an attack on the wider society,” he said.
“I remember that day well,” he said, recounting 29 December 2013, when a group of around eight men came to his Cairo hotel room and without explanation started searching it, before talking him away. While he was aware that the media was under some pressure in Egypt, the arrest came as a surprise. He felt as long as they stuck to their journalistic principles and didn’t push boundaries, they would be fine.
“There have been plenty of stories before where I’ve pushed boundaries, when I fully expected to get a knock on the door from the police, when I know I’ve upset governments,” he explained. But this time around, he hadn’t gone looking for difficult stories or made a conscious effort to try and challenge the government, so he “genuinely didn’t think it was going to be an issue.”
Greste was imprisoned together with Al Jazeera producer Baher Mohamed and Al Jazeera English’s Cairo bureau chief Mohamed Fahmy. He said they forced themselves to consider that they might be convicted, but never seriously believed it.
While there were “some very dark moments”, he insisted anger wasn’t his dominant emotion, believing that letting anger take hold of the situation would only hurt himself. They were broadly treated with respect in prison, and never physically threatened. “The problem is that in prison…what really matters is your own head, your own mind and how you cope with it.”
Egypt
Index has reported extensively on the situation confronting free expression in the country
Greste spoke of the importance of having a routine and some structure to his day, crediting seemingly simple things like meditation, exercise, studying and even cooking with helping him though the ordeal.
“The only way through is to set your horizon, to set a target date, to set something that’s manageable,” he said. “What you do is narrow your horizon, to the thing that you think you can cope with. Sometimes that was the end of next week, or it would be to the next visit. Sometimes it would be simply to the end of the day.”
Today, he doesn’t feel traumatised, and believes that we are all more capable of dealing with difficult situations than we think. And when discussing the conditions in prison, it was clear he had kept his humour. “The less said about the toilets the better,” he joked.
If his detention had been a surprise, so was his release. He had been expecting his brother for a visit, when he got the unexpected message to pack his bags — he was going home. Himself, Fahmy and Mohamed had discussed the possibility that one of them might be released before the others, and all agreed that if that were to happen, there would be no doubt that that person should go.
And yet, Greste said walking away and leaving Mohamed and others (Fahmy was receiving medical treatment at the time) behind was not easy. “And I still feel that and I still feel quite anguished about it.” His two colleagues have now been released on bail, with their retrial set to start on Monday.
Greste was also keen to remind us that while the three of them had been given the most media attention, many others had been caught up in the case — including three young students, a businessman and journalists sentenced in absentia.
“We can’t forget that sympathy tends to go with people who you identify with. As a European, as a white guy, it’s easier for white Europeans to identify with me than it is to identify with an Egyptian. I’m not suggesting for a second that that makes Baher’s case any less worthy. And in a way we need to bear that in mind, that because of that trend, it’s so easy to let local journalists slip through the cracks,” he also added. “It is the locals that get hit, and the freelancers in particular.”
He said he’ll continue to report, though he is not yet sure what form his work will take. He also hopes to continue to speak out for press freedom.
“One of the most extraordinary elements of this, and one that we are in danger of losing, if we do not make a conscious effort to hold on to, is the unity of purpose that emerged within the media community around our case. For some reason, the community right across the globe pulled together in a way that I think is absolutely unprecedented; we’ve never seen anything like this ever before,” he said.
“If we lose that sense of purpose, then we lose something that we have created of enormous value. I think its very difficult to maintain, particularly under the current circumstances, but I think it’s incumbent on everybody to recognise it, to make use of it, not just in our case but in the case of every journalist that’s been imprisoned.”
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