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Index held its annual awards on Wednesday, the biggest night in its organisational calendar. This year another crop of amazing individuals enter the Index fold and we pledge to do as much as possible to help them fight oppression (whilst not forgetting about our previous winners – we will free Toomaj Salehi).
I want the names of the 2024 winners to become household ones, so allow me to repeat them here – Iranian journalist, Nasim Soltanbeygi; Palestinian human rights lawyer, Diala Ayesh; the Ugandan media outlet, Kuchu Times; Russian “artivist”, Aleksandra Skochilenko; and Evgenia Kara-Murza, the wife of former Russian political prisoner Vladimir Kara-Murza, who was the powerhouse behind his release. Read more about the winners here.
It was a big week for Index. It was also a big week for Hong Kong. On Tuesday 45 of the pro-democracy activists HongKong47, as they’re known, were sentenced to between four and 10 years in prison. The Hong Kong authorities have tried to present this as justice and the usual Chinese Communist Party (CCP) nationalists came out of the shadows to attack people who claimed otherwise.
My response to these online trolls is that these people simply campaigned – legally and peacefully – to maintain some semblance of democracy and due process in a city once regarded as the most free in Asia. Fortunately, jail has not fully crushed their spirits. Joshua Wong playfully yelled from court as he was escorted away shouting “I love Hong Kong, bye bye”, whilst Tiffany Yuen wore a Liverpool FC top (the team’s anthem is You’ll Never Walk Alone).
With barely a day to process this grim news, Hong Kong media mogul and democracy activist Jimmy Lai was then in court to resume his case. I’ve not met Jimmy, but through a combination of meeting his remarkable son Sebastien, publishing his letters from prison and reading a lot about him, I feel as if I know him by this stage. Keir Starmer raised Jimmy’s case with Xi Jinping on Monday and I hope this signals a change in direction from the UK government, who’ve been far too quiet on this until now. It’s a disgrace that Jimmy has already spent so many years in jail.
I want to end with news that I heard via Fawzia Koofi, who was a prominent female MP in Afghanistan before she fled the country. It has not been reported internationally – school girls in certain areas of Afghanistan are failing year six on purpose because they are barred from attending the next school year. Repeating the same grade is the only way to stay in school.
The situation for girls and women in Afghanistan is so extreme and horrible that many people simply try not to think about it. But we can’t do that. At our Wednesday awards, a top UK journalist spoke to me specifically about what we can do to help in the UK. It’s a question the Index team often asks; we’ve done a lot of work in this area, including publishing journalism from and by Afghan women and pressing the UK government on its visa policy for Afghan journalists. But it’s clear that we need to do more.
Afghan women and girls are the most censored people in the world today. So if you’re in Afghanistan, reading this right now, know this – you’re not forgotten. A group of dedicated, engaged and influential people and organisations really care. Together we will try our hardest to help.
Apologies for another newsletter hitting your inbox that opens on the US election results, but it feels remiss not to talk about something that could have large implications for global free expression. Donald Trump is not a free speech hero. As I wrote on Wednesday here his attacks will start with the media. Where they will stop is anyone’s guess. To say we are unnerved by the prospect of another four years of Trump is to understate. With him at the helm the USA could become a hybrid regime, a country merging autocratic features with democratic ones.
While our concerns are first for the people in the USA, we are also worried about what this means globally. Who will criticise China, Russia, Saudi Arabia and the like for their gross attacks to free expression with the same clout as the USA? What terrible things will happen while we are all distracted by the clown in the White House?
But on the note of distraction, I want to end there in terms of Trump and instead talk about other things of import from the world of free expression this week.
First up, Cop29. It starts on Monday and it is keeping to tradition, namely being held in a country that thrives on both oil and the suppression of human rights – in this case Azerbaijan. The Azerbaijan government has long engaged in a crackdown on civil society, which has only heightened over the last few years. Azerbaijan authorities claim they are “ensuring everyone’s voices are heard” at Cop29. This is a lie. Prominent activists, journalists and government critics have recently been jailed, including key voices on the climate crisis. In April, for example, they arrested prominent climate justice activist Anar Mammadli and placed him in pre-trial detention, where he remains.
Such harassment has forced many local activists to leave Azerbaijan. Those who remain risk prosecution and retaliation if they dare voice criticism during Cop29. One person who is not deterred is Danish artist Jens Galschiøt (the artist behind the Tiananmen Pillar of Shame). He and his team are currently transporting three sculptures to Baku to highlight climate injustice. We will be watching closely what happens next.
Beyond Baku, we were disturbed to read this week of a Papuan news outlet, Jujur Bicara (also known as Jubi), which was attacked with a bomb. The bomb damaged two cars before staff at the paper were able to put out the fire. Jubi editor Victor Mambor said that he’s been the victim of a string of attacks, which he believes relate to his work.
As we approach the year’s end we’re reflecting on just what a brutal year it has been for media freedom. Ditto protest rights. Those protesting Mozambique’s election last month can attest to this – at least 18 have been killed since the 9 October vote, with police firing tear gas at protesters this week in the capital Maputo, while in Belarus around 50 people were recently detained, all of whom were connected to peaceful protests around the 2020 elections.
Finally, a good news story, of sorts. The Satanic Verses is no longer banned in India. A court in the country overruled a decades-long import ban on the book. I say good news of sorts because lifting the ban seems to be down to an administrative error. A petition was filed in 2019 on the grounds that the ban violated constitutional rights to freedom of speech and expression. The man who filed the petition, Sandipan Khan, requested a copy of the notification that banned the import of the book back in 1988. When he was informed that the document could not be located, the Delhi High Court ruled that it had “no other option except to presume that no such notification exists”. It’s not every day we get wins in the free speech world so we’ll take this one.
On the note of Salman Rushdie, who was our 2023 Trustees Award winner at our annual Freedom of Expression Awards, we’ve just announced the shortlist for our 2024 awards. Click here to see the amazing individuals and organisations who are holding the line on free expression today. And if you value free expression and you have been rattled by the events of this week please do consider donating to Index. We’re a small charity with big ambitions and a lot of that is down to the support of people like you.
Thank you and take care.