13 Jun 2025 | Americas, Asia and Pacific, Honduras, Mexico, News and features, Newsletters, Pakistan
When news broke on Monday of 17-year-old Sana Yousaf’s murder, it was first described as a potential “honour-based killing”. Yousaf, a social media influencer from Pakistan, had become a visible presence online. As outraged as we all were, Index didn’t comment initially, wanting to find out more of the facts. Now we have them. A 22-year-old man has confessed to killing her after she allegedly rejected him romantically.
At first glance, this horrendous murder might not appear to be a straightforward case of censorship. But it’s still part of a broader pattern: women’s voices being suppressed through violence.
Inside Pakistan, Yousaf’s death has triggered both grief and backlash. According to Usama Khilji, director of the digital rights group Bolo Bhi, some – mostly men – have questioned her online presence and even called for her family to delete her accounts. These attempts to silence her posthumously are a horrible sign of how threatening female visibility remains. More horrible still: Yousaf is not alone. In January, for example, teenage TikToker Hira Anwar was murdered by her father, who said he found her posts “objectionable”.
Pakistan is not an outlier. Rather these killings are part of a global pattern of femicide, the gender-motivated killing of women done by men who seek to control what women say and wear, who they love and more broadly how they live. While this control is extreme in countries like Pakistan, Afghanistan, Syria and Turkey, it’s just as entrenched across Latin America.
Naming this violence is a struggle. In Mexico, where Amnesty International estimated in 2021 that 10 women and girls were murdered every day, Index reported in 2023 on the widespread misclassification of femicides as homicides, which was seen as a strategy to protect the country’s global image. That was under former president Andrés Manuel López Obrador. Under the country’s new, first female president, Claudia Sheinbaum, there may be change. When 23-year-old influencer Valeria Márquez was shot dead last month while livestreaming on TikTok, the gender-based nature of her killing was formally acknowledged by the Jalisco prosecutor’s office.
These labels matter because, without calling it femicide, it’s hard to confront the systems that routinely and violently deny women a voice. Unsurprisingly, such systems deny women justice too. In Honduras – the country with the highest femicide rate per capita in Latin America – these murders don’t just go periodically unpunished, they’re often undocumented. Many are too afraid to name an assailant, fearing retaliation. Some survivors of violence are even told that women “should not talk about these things”.
So let’s not treat Sana Yousaf’s death as the act of a lone, disturbed man. Let’s call it what it is: another attempt to silence women who dare to speak.
6 Jun 2025 | Africa, Americas, DR Congo, Europe and Central Asia, Honduras, Hungary, Israel, Middle East and North Africa, News and features, Syria, Tanzania, United Kingdom
In the age of online information, it can feel harder than ever to stay informed. As we get bombarded with news from all angles, important stories can easily pass us by. To help you cut through the noise, every Friday Index publishes a weekly news roundup of some of the key stories covering censorship and free expression. This week, we look at Hungary’s crackdown on LGBTQ+ content, and Tanzania’s shutdown of the social media platform X.
A “climate of hostility”: Hungary’s ban of LGBTQ+ content on TV and in schools violates human rights
The rights of LGBTQ+ people in Hungary have been under attack for years, as Index covered last week. With the latest development being a new law banning LGBTQ+ demonstrations, president Viktor Orbán and his government have drawn continued ire from the EU as they continue to ramp up oppression. Now, a senior legal scholar at the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) has stated that Hungary’s 2021 “child protection law” violates basic human rights and free expression.
In her 69-page non-binding opinion, CJEU advocate general Tamara Ćapeta said that rather than protecting children from harm, the law “expands such harm”, highlighting the law’s “stigmatising effects” and the “climate of hostility” it has created towards LGBTQ+ people. The law prohibits the depiction of LGBTQ+ individuals in school educational content, or any TV show, film or advert shown before 10pm, placing this content in the same bracket as sexually explicit content. Ćapeta said that the law illustrates a government belief that “homosexual and non-cisgender life is not of equal value or status as heterosexual and cisgender life”.
While a “non-binding opinion” does not strictly carry legal weight or enforcement, Ćapeta’s assessment reflects a growing trend amongst EU lawyers and officials that Hungary is falling foul of EU regulations when it comes to freedom of expression. With tensions only rising, it seems only a matter of time before a breaking point is reached; though it is yet to be seen what action the EU will take against Hungary.
Social blackout: Tanzania bans X under guise of pornographic content
In a move that has drawn much criticism, Tanzania has blocked social media platform X from being accessed in the country, on the basis that it allows pornographic content to be shared, according to the government. Minister for information, communication and IT, Jerry Silaa has said that this content is against the “laws, culture, customs, and traditions” of the East African nation. However, human rights organisations within the country have reason to believe that digital repression and censorship are the true reasons behind the ban.
In a post on the banned platform, the Legal and Human Rights Centre noted that a similar shutdown occurred ahead of the 2020 Tanzanian general elections, and that other platforms such as Telegram and Clubhouse are similarly inaccessible in Tanzania without the use of a virtual private network (VPN).
Indeed, access to X specifically has been prohibited previously, aside from during elections. Following an incident in May this year when the official account of the Tanzania Police Force was hacked, posting falsely that the country’s president had died, the platform was blocked temporarily.
This recurrence of digital restrictions, particularly in the run up to the 2025 Tanzanian elections, raises further concerns about free expression in a country that was recently subject to international outcry over the detention and alleged torture of two human rights activists.
No comment: DR Congo bans reporting on former president and his entire party
The government of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DR Congo) has banned the media from reporting on the activities of former president Joseph Kabila, or interviewing any members of his party, the People’s Party for Reconstruction and Democracy.
The controversial former president returned to the country in May after two years in self-imposed exile. He had previously been accused of support for the Rwanda-backed M23 rebel group that is currently in conflict with Congolese forces, with senators stripping him of immunity and accusing him of treason. However, he has now returned to the M23-held city of Goma, in eastern DR Congo. Kabila has previously denied links with the rebel group, but has reportedly been seen visiting religious leaders in the presence of an M23 spokesperson.
Breaches of the blanket media ban will result in suspension, according to Christian Bosembe, head of DR Congo’s media regulator.
Kabila himself has not yet commented on the decision, but his party’s secretary Ferdinand Kambere described the decision as “arbitrary and illegal” in a statement on X, accusing the Congolese government of tyranny. A spokesperson for M23 stated that media outlets in rebel-controlled areas would not abide by the ban.
Detained for reporting: BBC crew held at gunpoint by IDF in southern Syria
The BBC has released a statement condemning the treatment of four BBC staff members and three freelance colleagues by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) while filming in southern Syria.
BBC Arabic special correspondent Feras Kilani detailed how himself and his crew were held at gunpoint on 9 May 2025 while at a checkpoint just outside Quneitra, which is located in the Israeli-Syrian buffer zone in the Golan Heights. Their phones and equipment were confiscated, before members of the crew were blindfolded, handcuffed and strip searched. Kilani was also strip searched and interrogated, with soldiers reportedly asking personal questions about his family, before proceeding to interrogate the rest of his team. Held for seven hours, their devices were inspected and some photos deleted. According to Kilani, they were told that the IDF knew everything about them, and that they would be tracked down if they published photos from the trip.
The BBC’s statement, released on 5 June, objected to the journalists’ treatment, stating that “the behaviour they were subjected to is wholly unacceptable.” The BBC has complained to the Israeli military, but is yet to receive a response.
Media abandoned: Journalist killed in Honduras despite state protection
Salvadoran journalist Javier Antonio Hércules Salinas was murdered by armed men on motorbikes in Santa Rosa de Copán, Honduras on 1 June. He was killed whilst driving a taxi, a part-time job he did alongside working as a reporter for the local news outlet, A Todo Noticias.
Salinas had been working in Honduras for more than 10 years, and had been under the protection of the Honduran government since October 2023, after being subjected to threats and a kidnapping attempt, which he escaped unharmed. Dina Meza, director of the Association for Democracy and Human Rights of Honduras, stated that the Secretariat of Human Rights (SEDH), Honduras’s government body responsible for implementing human rights plans, did not listen to advice for a more thorough security plan, and that state security had “[turned] their backs” on journalists in the country.
Salinas’s murder is the latest in a country that has proven to be extremely dangerous for journalists, with the Honduran College of Journalists (CPH) reporting that more than 100 journalists have been killed in the country since 2001. Honduras ranks 142 out of 180 countries for media freedom on Reporters Without Borders’ press freedom index.
19 May 2025 | Middle East and North Africa, News and features, Newsletters, Saudi Arabia
“Saudi Arabia criticised for ignoring the USA’s appalling human rights record” – that was the headline on satirical website News Thump, spoofing this week’s arms deal between the two countries. In these bleak times, I’ll take laughter where I can get it. But behind the joke is a darker truth: the USA’s steady backslide on human rights and Saudi Arabia’s ongoing abuses. This week, it’s Saudi Arabia that demands our attention.
Make no mistake – the petrostate is having a great week (at the top, that is). As is often the case, the good news for the elite rests on suffering at the bottom – and stories the government would rather you didn’t hear. On Wednesday, both Human Rights Watch and FairSquare sounded the alarm over a “surge” in migrant construction worker deaths, as Saudi Arabia ramps up preparations to host the 2034 World Cup. The reports are grim. There have already been fatalities, but pinning down exact numbers is nearly impossible: independent media are muzzled and labour unions banned.
We’ve been here before, with Qatar in 2022. This time we can only hope that speaking up early actually prompts change. We won’t hold our breath though. As our own investigation Oiling the Wheels of Injustice made clear, Saudi Arabia has very successfully thrown money at its image while its human rights record has tumbled.
But perhaps the most pressing story for Index this week is that of British father of four, Ahmed al-Doush. He’s just been sentenced to 10 years in a Riyadh court, allegedly for a tweet he posted seven years ago related to Sudan, which provided military support for Saudi Arabia in Yemen, and for his association with a Saudi critic in exile. He reportedly later deleted the tweet.
He was arrested last August when on holiday with his family. Saudi Arabia has form here: in 2021 Leeds University student Salma al-Shehab was detained during a visit to Saudi Arabia because of social media activity. She was handed a 34-year sentence in 2022 before being released earlier this year, following pressure from several advocacy groups, including Index.
We’ve now written to UK Foreign Secretary David Lammy, urging him to intervene in al-Doush’s case. Al-Doush has already missed the birth of his fourth child. His wife, Nour, says he’s in poor health due to a thyroid condition, raising serious concerns about his access to medical care.’
“The night times are the hardest for me when I’m alone and it’s quiet,” Nour told the Sunday Times ahead of her husband’s trial. Our message to her: Index is here to counter the quiet, and we will try as hard as we can to help get your husband released.
16 May 2025 | Europe and Central Asia, Middle East and North Africa, Saudi Arabia, Statements, United Kingdom
This letter was sent to UK Foreign Secretary David Lammy on Wednesday 14 May 2025, urging action on the case of British citizen Ahmed al-Doush and his imprisonment in Saudi Arabia over a seven-year-old tweet.
Re: Urgent Diplomatic Intervention – Unjust Imprisonment of Ahmed al-Doush in Saudi Arabia
Dear Foreign Secretary,
I am writing to you with deep concern regarding the case of Mr. Ahmed al-Doush, a British resident from Manchester, who has just been jailed for 10 years in Saudi Arabia, allegedly over a tweet he posted seven years ago.
Mr. al-Doush, a 41-year-old father of four and banking business analyst, has already spent nine months in al-Hair Prison in Riyadh prior to this sentencing. According to his family, Mr. al-Doush has done nothing to warrant such harsh punishment and appears to have been targeted simply for the peaceful expression of his views – a fundamental human right enshrined in both international and UK laws and a value the United Kingdom stands for. His wife has also said that he is in poor health.
This case once again raises serious concerns about the safety and rights of UK residents abroad, something we have highlighted in the cases of Jimmy Lai and Alaa Abd El-Fattah. We urge the FCDO to take immediate steps to support Mr. al-Doush.
We respectfully call on the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office to:
- Publicly demand the immediate release of Ahmed al-Doush, highlighting the unjust nature of his detention and sentencing.
- Provide Mr. al-Doush with full consular support, including legal assistance and regular welfare and health checks.
The United Kingdom has a responsibility to stand up for the rights of those it represents. We urge you not to allow this grave injustice to go unchallenged.
We thank you in advance for your attention to this urgent matter and I look forward to your prompt action.
Yours sincerely,
Jemimah Steinfeld
