21 Jun 2011 | Index Index, Middle East and North Africa, minipost
On Saturday the Agence France-Presse bureau in Amman was attacked. The office was reportedly stormed by a dozen men armed with clubs who smashed furniture and telephones and threw files to the ground. Two days before the attack, editor in chief Randa Habib was threatened by an anonymous caller after the agency reported that stones and bottles had been thrown at King Abdallah’s motorcade during a visit to a settlement 200km north of the capital. Jordan’s Minister of State for Communications and Media Affairs, Taher Adwan, said that reports of violence by some media agencies were groundless.
17 Jun 2011 | Azerbaijan News, Index Index, minipost
American journalist Amanda Erickson and British activist Celia Davies Carys were followed home and beaten by four men on 15 June in Baku. The women are in Baku to train local journalists. Carys sustained a broken arm in the attack.
17 Jun 2011 | Index Index, minipost
A policeman was arrested yesterday (16 June) as the key suspect in the killing of Ibrahim Foday, a journalist for Exclusive newspaper. Foday was stabbed five days ago in Freetown while covering a riot on a land dispute, the cause of his death was not initially made clear. Sierra Leone journalists are now condemning his murder. The president of the Sierra Leone Association of Journalists, Umaru Fofanah, said: “Journalists in Sierra Leone must not continue being the endangered species.”
16 Jun 2011 | Index Index, minipost, News
Andrey Pochobut, a correspondent for the Polish newspaper GazetaWyborcza who stands accused of defamation and “insulting the president”, is facing a four-year prison sentence. The trial began yesterday in Leninski district court, Belarus, with journalists and family members excluded from proceedings. There are now serious concerns over whether Pochobut will receive a fair trial. The offending articles appeared on the Gazeta Wyborcza website, the Belaruspartisan.org site and in his personal blog. Pochobut would be the fourth journalist sent to prison on a charge of “insulting the president” if he is found guilty. The trial continues.
