The offices of Journalistic Freedoms Observatory (JFO), an Iraqi media watchdog, were raided by around 30 armed men on Wednesday. The men took away computers, cameras, video cameras, bulletproof jackets and archives from the office. The director of JFO blamed the government for the attack: “The government is behind this attack. The JFO is fighting for media freedom to become a reality in Iraq and, as such, clearly poses a threat to the authorities”.
Turkish foreign minister Ahmet Davutoglu has dismissed remarks made by the US ambassador in Ankara. Diplomat Francis J Ricciardone expressed concerns about press freedom in the country. His comments came in response to the detention of four journalists following a raid on opposition news portal Oda TV. The foreign minister said that he did not think it was right for “ambassador to pass judgment on an ongoing criminal investigation”, and claimed press freedom was not the issue.
Istanbul police raided leading independent news portal odatv.com and searched the homes of its administrators. Those detained were the neonationalist site’s owner, Soner Yalçin and administrators Baris Terkoglu, Baris Pehlivan and Ayhan Bozcurt. The raids were ordered by Zekeriya Öz, a prosecutor in Ergenekon investigation, on the grounds that the site was holding confidential documents. The ongoing Ergenekon inquiry focuses on elements of the “deep state” working to subvert the government. Yalçin has published a book which denounces the prosecutors in the Ergenekon probe, critics of the case have alleged that the government is using the investigation to silence dissidents.
The building of 14 October, a Yemeni national media company, was overrun by soldiers on 21 April in order to confiscate the latest issue of Al-Tariq, a daily newspaper it publishes. The reason for seizing the outlet was that the newspaper ran a story about a raid by soldiers on a police station, which took place the day before in the nearby town of Al-Tawahi. According to Al Tariq’s report, the raid was the result of a dispute between a police and a soldier during an operation to remove illegally-built homes outside Al-Tawahi.