CONTENTS

Dangerous Assignments Fall|Winter 2004

Committee to Protect Journalists AS IT HAPPENED Executive Director: Ann Cooper Russia steps up repression. Cuba still imprisons journalists. Brazil Deputy Director: Joel Simon proposes restrictions. Eritrea kicks out last foreign correspondent...... 2

Dangerous Assignments IN FOCUS By Amanda Watson-Boles Editorial Director: Bill Sweeney Terrorists in Pakistan injure journalists and police in a double Senior Editor: Amanda Watson-Boles bombing...... 3 Designer: Virginia Anstett Printer: Photo Arts Limited COMMENTARY By Frank Smyth Where will the United States stop in compelling reporters’ testimony? ...... 4 Committee to Protect Journalists Board of Directors CPJ REMEMBERS: Francisco Ortiz Franco By Joel Simon A Tijuana editor is gunned down, but his passion lives on...... 5 Honorary Co-Chairmen: Walter Cronkite The Fixers By Elisabeth Witchel Terry Anderson In hot spots around the world, major news organizations rely more Chairman: David Laventhol on local journalists to guide, translate, and make arrangements. Now, Vice Chairman: Paul E. Steiger with dangers growing for the “fixers,” the media face new questions...... 6 Andrew Alexander, Franz Allina, PLUS: Letter from Iraq By P. Mitchell Prothero Peter Arnett, Dean Baquet, Tom “We don’t need or want you here”—and it shows...... 9 Brokaw, Josh Friedman, Anne Garrels, James C. Goodale, Cheryl Gould, Charlayne Hunter-Gault, Alberto A Story Is No Crime By Joel Simon Ibargüen, Gwen Ifill, Steven L. An extraordinary coalition secures a hard-fought victory against criminal Isenberg, Jane Kramer, Anthony libel in Costa Rica—and may have laid out a road map for the future...... 11 Lewis, David Marash, Kati Marton, Michael Massing, Geraldine Fabrikant PLUS: An Editor on Trial Metz, Victor Navasky, Burl Osborne, Tempo editor Bambang Harymurti talks with CPJ’s Abi Wright. . . . .13 Charles L. Overby, Clarence Page, Norman Pearlstine, Erwin Potts, Under Siege By Saparmurad Ovezberdiyev Dan Rather, Gene Roberts, Sandra Mims Rowe, John Seigenthaler, and with an introduction by Nina Ognianova Paul C. Tash A Turkmen reporter angered the government with his interviews and “endless broadcasts”—and found himself under assault...... 15 Published by the Committee to Protect Journalists, 330 Seventh PLUS: In Exile By Jennifer Friedlin Avenue, 11th Floor, New York, N.Y. Forced to flee, journalists find both freedom and problems...... 17 10001; (212) 465-1004; [email protected]. Glasnost and Now By Ann Cooper Find CPJ online at www.cpj.org. Valery Ivanov and Aleksei Sidorov were stirred by the possibilities of a free press. Their lives—and that promise—were snuffed out...... 20 PLUS: Eleven Murders, No Justice The lives taken as Russia stands by...... 22

DISPATCHES: Censoring a Crisis By Kamel Labidi How the Sudanese government’s choke hold on the press enables war and destruction...... 23

NEWSMAKERS: Border Busters By Amanda Watson-Boles Amid bitter animosities, Armenian and Azerbaijani journalists take small steps—together...... 25 CORRESPONDENTS: ‘Rebellion’ for Press Freedom By Julia Crawford On the cover: Pakistani fixer and journalist Khawar Mehdi Rizvi, who Journaliste en Danger is the first line of defense for the embattled was detained and charged with sedi- Congolese press...... 28 tion, conspiracy, and impersonation ON THE WEB: Without a Net By Amanda Watson-Boles for helping two French correspon- Zouhair Yahyaoui went from Web publisher to political prisoner. Now, dents. he’s at it again...... 30 Photo: Reuters/Rizwan Saeed KICKER By Mick Stern ...... 32

Dangerous Assignments 1 AS IT HAPPENED

A look at recent red-letter cases from the CPJ files…

May independent press. More than two September dozen other journalists remain jailed. CPJ names Iraq as the most dan- 3 9 The last remaining foreign corre- gerous place in the world to work as a 22 Francisco Ortiz Franco, co-editor spondent in Eritrea leaves after the gov- journalist. Cuba, Zimbabwe, and Bangla- of the Tijuana-based weekly Zeta, is ernment orders his expulsion. Jonah desh also make CPJ’s annual list of gunned down in apparent retaliation Fisher worked for the BBC and Reuters. the 10 worst places to be a journalist. for his work. (See “CPJ Remembers,” page 5.) 16 Bambang Harymurti, chief editor of June Indonesia’s Tempo magazine, is con- July victed in a high-profile criminal defama- 1 The popular Russian news program tion case. He receives a one-year “Namedni” is canceled under govern- 9 Paul Klebnikov, editor of Forbes prison sentence but vows to appeal. ment pressure, and anchor Leonid Russia, is killed in a drive-by shoot- (See “An Editor on Trial,” page 13.) Parfyonov (below) is fired. Days ing outside his office in Moscow. He before, Parfyonov had interviewed the was the 11th journalist to be killed in October widow of slain Chechen separatist Russia in a contract-style murder in leader Zelimkhan Yandarbiyev. The four years. (See “Glasnost and Now,” 5 A Sierra Leonean court sentences interview was cut from the broadcast page 20.) Paul Kamara, editor and publisher of seen in much of the country. the newspaper For Di People, to two August years in prison on charges of “sedi- tious libel.” The newspaper had pub- 7 The Iraqi government closes the lished articles that offended President Baghdad office of the Qatar-based Ahmad Tejan Kabbah. Ⅲ news channel Al-Jazeera and bars it from newsgathering in Iraq. The gov- ernment says the ban is designed to As They Said “protect the people of Iraq.” Reuters/Stringer “What is free press? There is no free press anywhere. It’s not in 3 Rebels take control of Bukavu in 20 Brazilian President Luiz Inácio eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, “Lula” da Silva (below) sends a bill to England; it’s not in the United forcing three radio stations off the air Congress to “guide, discipline, and States. We’d like to know what and causing several journalists to go supervise” journalists. The govern- free press is in the first place.” into hiding. The insurrection leads to ment says it is trying to improve –Isaias Afewerki, president of press freedom abuses nationwide. journalism, but the bill comes after Eritrea, where 17 journalists are a series of reports detailing alleged imprisoned 17-24 Cuban authorities release government corruption. BBC online, September 10, 2004 Manuel Vázquez Portal (below) and “The fact that no one is con- Carmelo Díaz Fernández, who were victed for killing journalists imprisoned for more than a year really encourages people to in a government crackdown on the attack media practitioners.” –Inday Espina-Varona, chair- woman of the National Union of AP/Dario Lopez-Mills Journalists of the Philippines, Italian freelance journalist Enzo 25 where 45 journalists have been Baldoni, who was kidnapped by mili- killed since 1985 tants while traveling to the Iraqi city of Los Angeles Times, September 12, Najaf, is shown murdered in video. 2004 (See “Letter from Iraq,” page 9.)

2 Fall | Winter 2004 IN FOCUS Reuters/Zahid Hussein

Karachi, Pakistan

n a number of occasions Police officers and journalists worldwide, terrorists have converged on the scene to investi- O used a double-bombing tech- gate. About 30 minutes after the initial nique: detonating a small explosive blast, another, much stronger, bomb to draw a crowd, then setting off detonated, injuring dozens and killing another to inflict heavy damage once one officer. police and rescue workers arrive. Police blamed the attack on Such attacks put not only emergency Islamic militants who had tried to personnel at risk but also journalists, assassinate Pakistani President Pervez who are often among the first to Musharraf in 2002, according to arrive at the scene. Agence France-Presse (AFP). A U.S. In the crowded port city of official told AFP that the attackers Reuters/Zahid Hussein Karachi, Pakistan, on the afternoon might have struck the cultural center of May 26, a car bomb exploded out of a mistaken belief that it was Washington Post quoted the head of shortly after 5 p.m. in front of the connected to the U.S. government. police operations as saying that the Pakistani-American Cultural Center, a Dozens of journalists, including second bomb was hidden in a car private, English-language school AFP photographer Amer Qureshi that had been stolen only 90 minutes located near the residence of the U.S. (right), were injured by shrapnel before the attack. Ⅲ consul general. that flew in the second blast. The —Amanda Watson-Boles

Dangerous Assignments 3

COMMENTARY

tempt and at least four other In San Francisco, U.S. prosecutors reporters were subpoenaed in a fed- sent letters to journalists from The eral investigation into which admin- San Francisco Chronicle and The San Breaking istration officials leaked the name of Jose Mercury News asking them to a CIA operative. A government offi- turn over documents and confiden- cial’s willful disclosure of an under- tial sources for stories about alleged a Bond cover CIA officer is a crime. steroid use by professional athletes— Here is where politics loom large— including the source of grand jury and the government’s strategy raises transcripts, excerpts of which were By Frank Smyth questions. Chicago U.S. Attorney published in the Chronicle. Patrick Fitzgerald, a rising star in the Justice Department guidelines WASHINGTON, D.C. Justice Department who was named state that “the department’s policy is hat kind of country forces special prosecutor to the case, put the to protect freedom of the press, the journalists to name their initial squeeze not on syndicated news-gathering function, and news Wsources, and what signal columnist Robert Novak, who broke media sources.” Only in “exigent cir- does it send worldwide? the story, but on several reporters cumstances, such as where immedi- By most accounts, U.S. prosecu- peripherally involved, including two ate action is required to avoid the tors have targeted more journalists who never even wrote about it. loss of life, or the compromise of a this year than in decades, with federal Novak named Valerie Plame as the security interest” may a journalist be judges ordering them to reveal confi- CIA operative on July 14, 2003. Plame compelled to testify. Even then it dential sources or face fines and jail. is married to former U.S. diplomat should come only after “the express The Justice Department denies Joseph C. Wilson IV, whom the Bush approval of the attorney general.” mounting a coordinated campaign. administration sent to Niger to inves- “We still follow our procedures But there is no denying that authori- tigate allegations that Iraq was on every case that comes through,” ties are demanding that journalists attempting to buy enriched uranium. Corallo says. But thousands have break one of the bonds that main- Novak’s column, which cited two signed a petition by the Reporters tains a free, independent press. unnamed administration sources, Committee for Freedom of the Press For years, federal prosecutors and appeared eight days after Wilson in protest. Taken together, the cases judges avoided calling journalists to wrote an op-ed in The New York Times send a message that the government testify in court, pursuing criminal and challenging the government on the is more willing to compel disclosure civil investigations by other means. uranium issue. Other reports surfaced of confidential sources. Particularly But in Boston last March, a federal later with Plame’s identity, most troubling is the Plame case, where judge issued a contempt ruling suggesting that administration offi- several journalists targeted were not against a correspondent for NBC’s cials had leaked the name in retalia- involved in the story that gave rise to Providence affiliate who refused to tion against Wilson. the potential crime. say who passed him an FBI surveil- Justice Department spokesman The world is taking notice. Many lance tape during a corruption probe. Mark Corallo notes that Attorney Gen- governments routinely compel journal- The judge levied a $1,000 daily fine. eral John Ashcroft typically approves ists to cooperate with investigations, Later this year, five reporters were press subpoenas but says, “Pat is act- compromising their independence and held in contempt for refusing to com- ing in his own capacity” as special obstructing their ability to gather news ply with subpoenas in a civil lawsuit prosecutor in the CIA case. Fitzger- that officials want kept secret. filed by former U.S. nuclear scientist ald’s office won’t discuss his strategy, Press advocates won a significant Wen Ho Lee, who alleges Privacy Act but he’s used aggressive tactics in international victory in The Hague in violations in his case against the gov- other cases, with Ashcroft’s approval. 2002, when a war crimes tribunal ruled ernment. His lawyers wanted to deter- This summer, Fitzgerald obtained that journalists should be compelled mine which officials leaked confiden- a subpoena for the telephone records to testify only when “the evidence tial personnel files to the press, and a of two New York Times reporters to sought is of direct and important federal judge fined the reporters. learn whether government officials value in determining a core issue in But the big blow came this sum- had leaked suspicions about an Islamic the case … and cannot reasonably be mer, when Time correspondent charity in Illinois. Times journalists obtained elsewhere.” Matthew Cooper was held in con- queried the charity before a govern- The U.S. government used to ment raid, and prosecutors suspect abide by an even higher standard. Frank Smyth is CPJ’s Washington, charity officials of destroying docu- Today, it’s not clear where it will stop in D.C., representative. ments before the FBI arrived. compelling reporters’ testimony. Ⅲ

4 Fall | Winter 2004 CPJ REMEMBERS

Francisco Ortiz Franco

By Joel Simon

rancisco Ortiz Franco, known to from the Arellano Félix cartel his friends as Pancho, was a quiet ambushed and nearly killed Zeta Fman who spoke loudly in print. Editor Jesús Blancornelas, with In person, he was so reserved whom Ortiz Franco was very that you could spend an hour in a close. In 1988, Zeta co-founder crowded room with him and barely Héctor Félix Miranda was mur- realize he was there. Neat, precise, dered by two bodyguards and invariably dressed in a jacket employed by Jorge Hank Rhon, a and tie, Ortiz Franco was a family powerful businessman and race- man who was more interested in get- track owner who was recently ting home than going out for a beer elected mayor of Tijuana. after a long day at the office. Ortiz Franco also served on a His gifts were these: Ortiz Franco panel created by the Miami-based was a keen observer; a determined Inter American Press Association listener; a man who gathered facts, and the Mexican government to sifted through information, asked review the official investigation considered questions, and gave into the murders of Felíx Miranda careful thought before reaching and Victor Manuel Oropeza, a conclusions. journalist killed in Ciudad ijuana

Once he did, he spoke with pas- Juárez in 1991. /T

sion and courage. Ortiz Franco Just before noon on June 22, Zeta wrote the editorials for Zeta, the 2004, Ortiz Franco was returning Slain journalist Francisco Ortiz Franco muckraking Tijuana weekly he from a medical appointment in helped found in 1981. In his signed the upscale Rio zone in Tijuana. He Prosecutors said members of the editorials and special reports, Ortiz buckled his 11-year-old son, Héctor Arellano Félix drug cartel were Franco denounced corruption, railed Daniel, and his 9-year-old daughter, responsible for the murder, and that against injustice, and identified drug Andrea, into the backseat of his car several suspects were in custody. traffickers by name. His last piece, and got behind the wheel. A gunman For 24 years, Ortiz Franco signed published on May 14, 2004, alleged approached and shot him four times Zeta’s weekly editorials. After he was that the State Attorney General’s in the head and chest as his children killed, Zeta’s editorial board announced Office was selling police credentials to watched. Ortiz Franco was 48. that, as a tribute and protest, its edi- gunmen from the powerful Arellano State officials in Baja California torials would continue to run under Félix drug cartel. initially headed the investigation, Ortiz Franco’s byline until his mur- Ortiz Franco knew that his edito- but on August 18, federal authori- der was fully solved. The quiet man’s rials and reports had earned Zeta ties in Tijuana announced that they passion lives on. Ⅲ many enemies. In 1997, armed gunmen would assume control because evi- dence linked the killing to organ- For updates on the Ortiz Franco case, Joel Simon is CPJ’s deputy director. ized crime. visit www.cpj.org.

Dangerous Assignments 5 COVER STORY man

The AP/Musa Far

A Pakistani soldier guards the Afghan border near Quetta, where journalist Khawar Medhi Rizvi had traveled with two French correspondents before being arrested in Fixers December 2003.

On the front lines of international journalism, local fixers face growing dangers, and their Western employers face tougher questions.

By Elisabeth Witchel

hen Marc Epstein and Jean- conspiracy, and impersonation, which because of their work for foreign Paul Guilloteau, two French can carry a sentence of life in prison. journalists. Wreporters writing an article Ironically, when police arrested the In a climate of heightened danger for the newsweekly L’Express about men in December 2003, Rizvi, as a for the press, local fixers, though they Taliban activity along Pakistan’s bor- Pakistani citizen, was the only one may blend in more than Westerners, der, were arrested for traveling to the who wasn’t violating the country’s have become targets themselves area without government permission, restrictive visa laws. because of their association with they were released on bail two weeks Rizvi is not the only local fixer international media outlets. And as later and allowed to return home. to face serious consequences for fixers’ work becomes both more sub- But Khawar Mehdi Rizvi—the local his work with foreign reporters. At stantial and more dangerous, news journalist hired as their “fixer” to particular risk are local media organizations face tougher questions guide, translate, and arrange inter- workers assisting in covering the in navigating this new terrain in views—was detained for more than U.S.-led war in Iraq and terrorism in international journalism. three months. For the first six weeks, general. In Iraq, nine fixers, transla- during which Rizvi says he was tor- tors, and drivers have been killed in ixers have long worked with for- tured, police denied even holding him. 2004, while at least a dozen others Feign correspondents, doing every- He was later charged with sedition, have been threatened, attacked, or thing from booking hotel rooms to injured. At least five Pakistani jour- scheduling interviews with top offi- Elisabeth Witchel is CPJ’s journalist nalists have been detained, assaulted, cials. While the term is sometimes assistance coordinator. or threatened in the last year broadly applied to include drivers and

6 Fall | Winter 2004 travel guides, established fixers are graduates. To some extent, universi- sarily be viewed as legitimate jour- generally local hires, many of whom ties have bred a generation of jour- nalists, due to the informal hiring are well-respected journalists in their nalists who need prosthetic devices to process, which usually does not own countries. They work on a short- cover certain areas,” Schell argues. include a contract. According to Paki- term basis providing expertise, trans- stani journalist Iqbal Khattak, before lation, contacts, and research. ixing has always been a risky busi- September 11, the term “fixer” was For some, the word itself is prob- Fness, even before the Iraq war unknown in Pakistan and even now lematic. “Fixer is the wrong term,” and the struggle against terrorism. is viewed with suspicion by intelli- says Andrew Maykuth, foreign corre- According to Juan Tamayo, a veteran gence agents and police there. spondent-at-large for The Philadel- foreign correspondent and now chief- Widespread Internet access is phia Inquirer. “They are really jour- of-correspondents at The Miami Her- another reason that local fixers can run nalists. … Their work demands the ald, that has always been true. “Fixers afoul of governments or religious same ethical standards of reporting.” are subject to local retaliation more groups more often, says one fixer with Though fixers traditionally worked than we are. And that’s the case eight years’ experience in Pakistan and behind the scenes, political condi- almost anywhere,” he says. “We do Afghanistan who asked not to be tions in today’s hot spots are push- our story; we leave. They stay.” named. “Foreign correspondents think ing them to the front lines. Kathy Two years ago, local Bangladeshi they are writing for a certain audience, Gannon, currently on leave from her journalist Saleem Samad and human and that they are not putting their fix- post as Islamabad bureau chief for rights worker Priscilla Raj were ers at risk. But now any warlord can get The Associated Press, says, “Fixers detained for nearly two months and an article online, and they are frequently and stringers are used more and tortured in custody for their work as translated into the local language and more to go into areas that, as a West- fixers for a U.K.-based Channel 4 doc- circulated. If the story offends some- erner, it is difficult to penetrate, such umentary on politics and religion in one, the fixer will get a visit.” as the tribal areas of Pakistan.” Bangladesh. Acquitté Kisembe, a fixer Greater dependence on fixers In Iraq, where Western journalists for Agence France-Presse in the has brought some benefits. Tradi- are routinely targeted for attack, Democratic Republic of Congo, disap- tionally, fixers’ work is uncredited, media outlets rely on local hires to peared while on assignment in June but in the last year, a number of report in dangerous areas. (See “Getting 2003 in the city of Bunia. He remains print media outlets have featured the Story,” Dangerous Assignments, missing and is presumed dead. And joint bylines or acknowledgments of Spring/Summer 2004.) Hannah Allam, in April 2002, Guatemalan fixer David local staff reporting. “Their role is Baghdad bureau chief for Knight Herrerra was abducted while on his changing from a source to a contrib- Ridder, says that their fixers have way to pick up former National Public utor,” Gannon says. taken on increasing responsibilities. Radio correspondent Gerry Hadden. Fixers are also developing profes- “Their work has changed in the last Herrerra later escaped. sionally. In Pakistan, says Khattak, year I’ve been here from making phone calls to going out and covering stories.” “What we’re seeing now are fixers Most observers believe that the international as surrogates,” says Orville Schell, dean of the Berkeley School of Jour- media community must do more to protect fixers. nalism. In Iraq, “they are the Seeing Eye Dogs, or rangers, for the men and women who can’t safely go out Today, Pakistani authorities and local journalists have developed an and do the reporting themselves.” religious groups routinely harass fix- interest in investigative journalism According to Schell, it is not only ers for their work with foreign corre- because of their work with corre- the dangers posed to correspondents spondents. Elizabeth Rubin, a con- spondents. According to Mark Seibel, by anti-Western sentiment that have tributing writer for The New York managing international editor of increased reliance on fixers. “The role Times who has worked with fixers in Knight Ridder’s Washington Bureau, of the fixer has grown with parachute both Pakistan and during the Balkan fixers in Iraq “are really learning the journalism,” he says, and notes that conflicts, says that in Serbia, fixers skills of journalism.” There are finan- since the end of the Cold War, media were often called in to report to the cial benefits as well. Maykuth of The outlets and journalism schools have Information Ministry, but they were Philadelphia Inquirer recalls that failed to cultivate regional expertise. not “chased down” as they are in Pak- during his many trips to Afghanistan “When I was in China, most corre- istan. Fixers there are also more vul- in fall 2001, he saw the daily rate of spondents there were Chinese studies nerable because they may not neces- fixers rise from US$30 to US$300.

Dangerous Assignments 7 ut money doesn’t always out- Though fixers are often aware of ronment training to all of its workers, Bweigh the risks. “I learned early the risks they are taking, some feel including fixers, going into potentially on that fixers are in the most dan- they are put in unfair positions. dangerous situations. According to ger,” says PBS “Newshour” Senior Pakistani fixers interviewed for this CNN Vice President for International Correspondent Elizabeth Farnsworth, article say they often try to dissuade Public Relations Nigel Pritchard, the who has used fixers in Haiti, the correspondents who ask to be taken definition of a hostile area expanded Middle East, and throughout Asia. to dangerous places but fear that so much in 2004 that it included the “As a correspondent for a national they will lose their jobs to someone Athens Olympics. Bill Spindle, foreign program, I can get a great deal of else if they decline altogether. “For desk editor at The Wall Street Journal, attention if I’m in danger, but what the money offered, there is always says his paper’s policy of treating about a local fixer?” someone who will take them,” says one fixers like employees has been con- Farnsworth recalls when her Hai- Pakistani fixer who asked not to be sistent, but that there is a substantial tian fixer was detained in Port-au- named. In Pakistan and Afghanistan, rise in the number of instances where Prince in 1994 while they were shoot- “There are also cultural dynamics at intervention is needed on a fixer’s ing footage in restricted areas. Author- play,” Gannon says. “People here really behalf. “We’re using them more often ities offered to release the fixer, but want to help out and are not comfort- and in more complicated situations,” only if the “Newshour” team left Haiti. able saying no.” Spindle says. Local journalists advised Farnsworth Most observers believe that the Still, argues Tina Carr, director of that the fixer’s safety depended on international media community must the London-based Rory Peck Trust, her departure, so the “Newshour” do more to protect fixers, although which assists freelance media workers, team left. He was eventually freed there has been a growing awareness this awareness has yet to translate into unharmed, but Farnsworth describes of the dangers. Knight Ridder’s widespread practice. “We hear of fixers it as one of the worst moments in her Baghdad bureau chief Allam says around the world who are not pro- career. “I consider it one of my prime that in Iraq, she has seen significant vided with the same security equip- duties to look after the people working changes in the last year, including ment as the correspondents they work for me,” she says. the introduction of security training, with or are not adequately compen- Some journalists, however, defensive driving courses, and flak sated for injury or death,” Carr says. believe that many correspondents jackets for all Knight Ridder fixers. To date, most cases where fixers are not sensitive enough when it Tamayo of The Miami Herald says or translators were evacuated from comes to exposing their fixers to that his office has purchased bullet- dangerous situations have been ad risk. “What is disturbing is the callow proof vests at a cost of $1,500 to hoc. With virtually no insurance or use of fixers by correspondents who $1,800 for Herald fixers and stringers medical compensation for interna- come into a region, don’t know it in Venezuela this year. tional short-term hires, news organi- well, then put [fixers] in dangerous Since the mid-1990s, CNN Inter- zations have to pay out of pocket, situations,” Gannon argues. national has provided hostile-envi- and decisions rely heavily on the individual relationships fixers have with their media outlets. According to Knight Ridder’s Seibel, “The rela- tionship is informal contract labor. How far should an international news organization go to help them? There is probably a need to review and go over policies.” While many journalists cite a moral obligation to help their fixers, there is also a professional impera- tive. By targeting fixers, govern- ments and militia groups ultimately el discourage local and international coverage of sensitive issues. Rizvi, whose criminal case was pending AP/Daniel Mor this fall, says, “What they did to me is “Newshour” crew Jaime Kibben (left), Elizabeth Farnsworth, and John Knoop sit in their message to people, telling them the back of a Haitian military pickup in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, in 1994 before leaving the country. not to report in those areas.” Ⅲ

8 Fall | Winter 2004 Letter from Iraq

As journalists become targets more often, a reporter finds a bunker mentality taking hold among the press corps.

By P. Mitchell Prothero

BAGHDAD, Iraq ecurity is tenuous for everyone in Iraq, but conditions for jour- Snalists have deteriorated to the point that many major news agencies now rely on local stringers and employees for newsgathering. Among nearly every constituency here, hostil- ity toward journalists has increased. Journalists, by necessity, are fixated on personal security. News organiza- tions have established themselves in compounds of private homes sur- rounded by blast walls, or in large hotel complexes with extensive secu- rity checkpoints. Such precautions, though not unique to the media, AP/Khalid Mohammed reflect a change from a year ago, In August, journalists raise their hands while crossing an area where fighters loyal to when journalists preferred lower-pro- cleric Muqtada al-Sadr were fighting U.S. forces in the Iraqi city of Najaf. file, less-secure accommodations on the theory that it would make them And with U.S. government con- held briefly by armed groups. Most less likely to be targets. tractors moving almost exclusively were released, but in August, Italian This bunker mentality has taken within heavily guarded compounds, freelance writer Enzo Baldoni became hold among the press corps in Iraq journalists have become primary the first to be killed by kidnappers. for a few reasons. Insurgents have Western targets. Naturally, Gilkey says, the abduc- attacked less-secure hotels once used tions have affected coverage. “Look by Westerners, including journalists. his year, a rash of kidnappings at the photo wires these days,” he The U.S.-led coalition is largely indif- Thas occurred, with publicity- says. “You see only Iraqi names on ferent to journalist safety, and, worse, hungry insurgents grabbing the only the photo credits. No breaking news Iraqi authorities are openly hostile. foreigners consistently available to is being shot by Western photogs them: journalists and coalition driv- because none can work these scenes Reporter and photographer P. Mitchell ers. “Who are [the insurgents] going like an Iraqi can.” Prothero served as CPJ’s Baghdad- to take?” Knight Ridder photographer Much of the problem is a nation- based consultant. He has reported David Gilkey asks. “They can’t get wide perception that Western jour- from Baghdad, Beirut, and through- their hands on anyone else.” nalists are spies or profiteers taking out the Middle East for United Press As of fall, at least 20 journalists advantage of the considerable misery International and other news outlets have been abducted for extended peri- of the Iraqi people. Because almost since 2000. ods in 2004, with numerous others every journalist under Saddam

Dangerous Assignments 9 Hussien’s regime was either cen- organized and has increasingly fallen photographer Allison Long took pic- sored or compromised, there is little under the control of gangsters looking tures of police beating a suspect in understanding among the public that to profit from journalists. In August, a August, she tells CPJ, a uniformed Western reporters are not shills for Mehdi offshoot held U.S. documentary officer tried to wrench away her cam- their governments. journalist Micah Garen for more than a era. When she resisted, a plain- Many British and U.S. reporters week despite the efforts of al-Sadr clothes officer came up from behind, lie to Iraqis about their nationalities himself to arrange a release. Garen drew and cocked his gun, and pointed and have elaborate cover stories in was eventually freed unharmed and it at her, saying he would kill her. A place should a problem arise with without a ransom, but only after kid- passing Iraqi government official locals. Several journalists have man- nappers who wanted a ransom clashed had to intercede. aged to convince coalition officials with the Mehdi leadership, which In June, I was chased and held at to put false country-of-origin infor- opposed such a demand. gunpoint after photographing Iraqi mation on coalition-issued press police and intelligence agents hitting credentials to lower their profiles. he breakdown of this most tenu- prisoners. Police dragged me for sev- But in many cases, this is not Tous connection to Mehdi forces— eral blocks before a commander finally enough. Insurgents have abducted or and a rise of even more militant fac- ordered my release and apologized. attacked reporters from a widening tions—bodes ill for journalists in But the worst example of a govern- range of countries, including nations Iraq. One U.S. photographer, who ment attack on the press happened such as France—not normally con- asked not to be named because he during this summer’s siege at the sidered hostile by Iraqis. continues to work in Baghdad, says Imam Ali Shrine in Najaf. At 10:30 “We see the journalists come and his Mehdi press contact has increas- p.m. on August 25, dozens of armed helped them, but what came from ingly turned to financial demands police, many of them masked, it?” asks Omar, an insurgent sympa- that border on extortion. stormed a Najaf hotel widely used by thizer who asked that his full name “When we first started going in, he journalists. Firing warning shots in not be used for safety reasons. He would meet us outside the neighbor- the lobby and beating down doors to has helped some journalists make hood and ensure our safety while rooms, police forcibly removed some contact with more mainstream Iraqi helping us access stories,” the photog- 60 journalists from the Bahr Najaf resistance groups but ended up see- rapher says. “Now he shows up when- Hotel and packed them into waiting ing little benefit. ever we enter the neighborhood, even trucks without explanation. “After I was put into the truck, one policeman leaned down and told The Iraqi public has little reason to believe that me in Arabic, ‘Now we are going to take you out and kill you. You will all Western reporters are anything but shills for their die.’ It was a clear attempt to terrify governments. us,” freelance photographer Thorne Anderson says. After being driven in an open “The journalists did nothing to if we don’t call him, and demands truck through a city where major help us, and now many mujahedeen $100 even if we don’t need his help.” street fighting was continuing, the consider them to be useless or targets,” Such payments are often made. reporters were herded into a coerced Omar says. “We think many must be Government attitudes have wors- press conference where the chief of spies for the Americans or Jews.” ened the situation. Best-known is the police complained about coverage by Some unexpected relationships interim government’s bald act of cen- the Dubai-based news channel Al- have formed, if only as a matter of sorship in banning the Qatar-based Arabiya. The journalists were held survival. The Mehdi Army, led by news network Al-Jazeera from news- for an hour without basis or charge. radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, gathering in Iraq. Less publicized is The U.S.-led coalition does not which battled U.S. and British forces the regular police harassment of counteract such intimidation. One in southern Iraq for months, made reporters of every stripe. Such cases coalition press official privately some efforts to protect reporters have escalated since the transfer of acknowledges that it wants journal- covering its activities. And its reli- power from the U.S.-led occupation at ists to embed with its forces or leave gious leadership attempted to be the end of June. Iraq. Otherwise, journalists are on honest brokers with the media. Iraqi police openly threaten jour- their own. “This is a dangerous com- Yet even that has disintegrated nalists at news events in an effort to bat zone,” he says, “and we don’t since summer. The Mehdi Army is dis- block coverage. When Knight Ridder need or want you here.” Ⅲ

10 Fall | Winter 2004 La Nación

tesy A Story Is No Crime Cour

La Nación reporter Mauricio Herrera Ulloa celebrates with his colleagues.

A court overturns a Costa Rican reporter’s conviction on criminal defamation, creating a precedent in Latin America—and offering hope elsewhere.

By Joel Simon

a Nación’s San José newsroom dinary coalition of press, legal, and alleged that Przedborski had abused erupted in cheers in early human rights groups from through- his diplomatic status by engaging in LAugust, when, at long last, a out Latin America—and offered hope questionable business practices. Herrera court overturned the 1999 criminal that those same tactics can be repli- included Przedborski’s denials in his defamation conviction against reporter cated around the world to eradicate stories and reported the allegations Mauricio Herrera Ulloa. The ruling by laws that criminalize journalism. in the context of the public debate the Inter-American Court of Human “The decision adds to the body of over Costa Rica’s practice of appoint- Rights “is a victory not only for me, international law guaranteeing free- ing honorary diplomats, a policy that but for all Costa Rican journalists,” dom of expression and confirms the was later abolished. Herrera said. universal nature of these standards,” None of that mattered to Przed- As exuberant as Herrera’s decla- says Toby Mendel, head of the legal borski, who brought the criminal ration was that day, press advocates program for one of the advocacy charges, or to the Costa Rican courts. hope it will prove to be an under- groups, the London-based anticensor- Costa Rican law makes it a criminal statement. ship organization Article 19. “The offense to publish information that The ruling, the first of its kind by coalition that came together to support could hurt someone’s reputation, the regional court, set an encourag- the case is unprecedented and shows even if the information is true. After ing precedent in Latin America and that a coordinated legal strategy can be lengthy proceedings, Herrera was reversed what had been a deflating a very powerful advocacy tool.” convicted, fined, and his name was nine-year court battle for La Nación. inscribed on an official list of crimi- The verdict followed years of lobby- he case stemmed from Herrera’s nals. The Costa Rican Supreme Court ing and legal advocacy by an extraor- TMay 1995 series for La Nación later upheld the conviction. about Félix Przedborski, who held an The verdict was a devastating CPJ Deputy Director Joel Simon “honorary” diplomatic post as Costa blow to Herrera and La Nación, long helped lead CPJ’s efforts in the Herrera Rica’s representative to the Interna- recognized as one of Latin America’s case and has been involved for several tional Atomic Energy Agency. Herrera’s best newspapers. It also sent a chill years in joint advocacy work to repeal articles were pretty tame by most through the Costa Rican press corps criminal defamation laws in Latin standards: Citing European press and had a ripple effect throughout America. accounts and other sources, the pieces Latin America, where journalists

Dangerous Assignments 11 often face criminal prosecutions for military dictatorship. Verbitsky was journalists founded, brought together libel. Citing Costa Rica’s reputation convicted but appealed to the Inter- journalists, academics, and lawyers as one of Latin America’s strongest American Commission on Human from throughout the hemisphere. democracies, La Nación lawyer Pedro Rights in Washington, D.C., an arm of Meeting in Buenos Aires, the group Nikken argued before the Inter-Amer- the Organization of American States called for the repeal of criminal ican Court that when the best behave (OAS). As part of a settlement between defamation laws and affirmed that badly, it sets a terrible precedent for Verbitsky and the Argentine govern- journalists should never be “criminally the rest of the hemisphere. ment mediated by the commission, prosecuted for what they publish, Argentina pledged to reform the transmit, or express.” Participants n fact, criminal defamation laws country’s criminal defamation law—a promised to support the newly created Iare on the books in countries commitment it has yet to fulfill. position of special rapporteur for throughout the world (see related story on page 13), and journalists are routinely prosecuted on defamation Criminal defamation laws are on the books in charges. While jail sentences are rare in Latin America, prosecutions are countries throughout the world, and journalists are not, and dozens of journalists in routinely prosecuted on defamation charges. places like Panama and Argentina have been tried and sometimes con- victed under these anachronistic But if the Verbitsky settlement freedom of expression at the OAS, and criminal statutes. In those countries, fell short on a practical level, the to defend journalists being criminally powerful political figures have used case succeeded in raising awareness prosecuted for their work. the courts to stifle public scrutiny of throughout Latin America about the The consensus forged in Buenos their activities. threat of criminal defamation laws. It Aires paid considerable dividends, One case that sparked widespread also made clear that the Inter-Ameri- with press groups throughout the condemnation involved Argentina’s can Commission on Human Rights region taking up cases. The special rap- former President Carlos Saúl Menem, could be an important vehicle for porteur’s office pushed for reform, too, who initiated criminal proceedings compelling governments to repeal or and in March 2001, the Inter-American in 1994 after investigative reporter modify these laws. Commission weighed in with an Horacio Verbitsky challenged the In June 2000, CPJ and the Argen- important affirmation. president’s assertion that he had tine press group Periodistas, which “The protection of a person’s rep- been tortured under the country’s Verbitsky and 30 other prominent utation,” the commission wrote, “should be guaranteed only through civil sanctions in those cases in which the person offended is a pub- lic official, a public person or a pri- vate person who has voluntarily become involved in matters of pub- lic interest.” Just as important, the commis- sion referred the Herrera case to the Inter-American Court, an OAS arm whose decisions are binding on member nations. Aware of the stakes, eight free press organiza- tions filed friend-of-the-court briefs. “Debate about the actions of public officials is the cornerstone of democ- racy,” CPJ argued in its brief, which was prepared by the law firm of La Nación Debevoise & Plimpton and signed by tesy 11 news organizations. “Because Mr. Cour Herrera’s articles reported on the con- La Nación reporter Mauricio Herrera Ulloa reads the Inter-American Court ruling that overturned the criminal defamation conviction against him. duct of a public official and matters

12 Fall | Winter 2004 of public concern, they merit the strongest possible protection.” Armando González, a lawyer and An Editor managing editor at La Nación, said that newspaper executives defending the case had felt like Sisyphus pushing on Trial a rock up a hill—until the friend-of- the-court briefs “finally helped push the rock over the top.” JAKARTA, Indonesia They reached the summit on Bambang Harymurti, chief editor of August 3, when the Inter-American Tempo magazine, was convicted of ommy Satria

Court overturned the conviction and criminal libel in September and sen- /T empo ordered the Costa Rican government tenced to a year in prison. Two col- T to pay Herrera US$20,000 in damages leagues were acquitted in the trial, Editor Bambang Harymurti speaks to and US$10,000 in legal fees. The court which stemmed from a 2003 article reporters in front of the Central Jakarta District Court in July 2004. found that critics of public officials citing allegations that powerful busi- must have “leeway in order for ample nessman Tomy Winata stood to profit Abi Wright: Explain the laws to me. debate to take place on matters of from a fire at a textile market. The Bambang Harymurti: The first one public interest.” The court also ruled article included a statement from is dissemination of information that that the requirement that Herrera Winata denying the allegation. caused a riot. … It’s actually an prove the truth of the allegations was Winata filed several civil court emergency law made in 1946. unreasonable and violated his right to actions along with his criminal com- AW: It’s ironic that this law is being freedom of expression. plaint, but the criminal case in partic- used against you, when in fact the A concurring opinion by the ular alarmed journalists worldwide. only riot was focused against you court’s president, Judge Sergio García The Tempo journalists were charged and your office. Ramírez, went further. He questioned under criminal defamation laws, as BH: The consequence is that if any- the legal basis for criminalizing well as with spreading false informa- one with power and money has a defamation at all and strongly sug- tion that provoked social discord. problem with an article, they can just gested that such laws should be The charge of provoking social send dogs, attack the press, and then repealed. While García did not specif- discord was based on a melee that put the editor in jail for 10 years. ically say that all criminal penalties occurred five days after the article And the funny thing is, the only wit- for defamation violate international was published, when more than 100 ness who said he was incited said he law, he indicated that governments men gathered at Tempo offices in read only the first two paragraphs. would have a hard time convincing Jakarta to protest the story. The pro- He didn’t read the whole article. … I him that such measures are necessary testers, one of whom said the group said to the judge, ‘Look, if you do or appropriate. represented Winata, assaulted at least this, you can put in jail the publisher two reporters. of the Koran or the Bible because o now comes the next step for Lawyers for Tempo contested the some kook quoted a few verses and Spress leaders. At CPJ’s offices in prosecution and cited several irregu- then became a terrorist.’ September, OAS Special Rapporteur larities, including the removal of the AW: I want to ask you about the day Eduardo Bertoni brought together original judge seven months into the the protesters came to the Tempo several of the people who had trial. The defense also claims that offices. They stormed their way in, formed the free press coalition to Winata perjured himself by denying there was a scuffle inside, and then discuss the impact of the Herrera rul- he had given an interview to Tempo, you all went to the police station. ing and a strategy for the future. even after the magazine produced an Was anybody ever punished for that? For one, the Herrera ruling should audiotape of the session. BH: One person got a suspended sen- make it significantly more difficult for Harymurti has vowed to appeal. tence. Another guy got acquitted. Latin American governments to pros- Tempo stands by the accuracy of its AW: People want these press laws to ecute journalists for criminal defama- story and has refused to apologize or be reformed. tion. A September 15 decision by the divulge its sources, as Winata’s sup- BH: At least the media law has Inter-American Court, in fact, seemed porters have demanded. Before the assigned journalists the role of to build on the Herrera decision. The verdict, Harymurti discussed the watchdog for the public interest. The judges ruled that a criminal defama- case with CPJ Asia Program Coordi- thing is, you cannot be critical and tion conviction in Paraguay violated nator Abi Wright. Here are excerpts. guarantee that people will not feel

Dangerous Assignments 13 insulted. So you should be free from BH: The Monday Blues. international law—and that the crimi- all these defamation laws if you can AW: So, looking forward, what’s the nal proceedings themselves violated prove that all those things consid- future? Are you optimistic? the American Convention on Human ered insulting were done within the BH: I’m more optimistic about the Rights because they were not “neces- corridor of good journalism. Supreme Court [where an appeal of sary in a democratic society.” AW: I saw something today in the the trial verdict would be heard]. My Such precedents—and the advo- paper listing corrupt judges. … Are hope is this would have a similar cacy tactics that led to them—give judges protected by these insult laws? effect to [the U.S. Supreme Court hope not only in Latin America but BH: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. They’re case] The New York Times vs. Sullivan also in places such as Indonesia, even protected by our Penal Code. in 1964—that the Supreme Court will Ukraine, and the Democratic Repub- Certain officials are protected. So if change the media law or create criteria lic of Congo, where reporters are reg- you insult certain officials— where the burden of proof will be ularly prosecuted, convicted, and AW: Even if what you say is true? such that it will be very difficult, sometimes jailed on criminal BH: Of course, for insult, truth is not unless a journalist writes with reck- defamation charges. Bertoni noted the matter. less disregard for the truth, that they that the Inter-American Court is AW: What about apologizing to Tomy cannot be made a criminal. examining criminal defamation in Winata? AW: Do you think that the press plays the context of international human BH: It would be a betrayal to apolo- a special role in Indonesia these days? rights laws—a very encouraging note gize. I cannot apologize for this arti- BH: Oh, especially now, it is a very crit- for the media worldwide. cle, because that would be saying ical role. We have a weak government, On the afternoon the verdict that this kind of article cannot be and many cases wouldn’t be opened came down in the Herrera case, La published, and that is a problem for up if the press were not there. Nación’s newsroom staff gathered for freedom of the press. AW: What is the public attitude a champagne toast. Herrera, accom- AW: Some have said they actually toward the press? Does the public panied by his wife, gave an emotional think that if you do go to jail it would appreciate it? speech thanking everyone for their be a good thing for press freedom, BH: No, you’re a pain. … The elite, support. Eduardo Ulibarri, a former because it would be so outrageous. many of the elite, are very critical. editor at La Nación, praised Herrera BH: I said to the people who work at One reason [former President] Suharto for his fortitude. Tempo, ‘Look, even if you have to be was in power for so many years was But the party did not last long. like a candle, give light for others so that he was very adept at co-opting “After the toasts, we all went back to they can find the true way, even at the the elite. So the elite under him had work,” says managing editor González. cost of losing ourselves, that would a much larger proportion of [wealth] “After all, we had a newspaper to put be worth the fight.’ … The problem is, than the rest of society. So the elite out.” The next day, Herrera’s legal vic- I’m not so sure that when they send us are against press freedom. tory was the lead story on Page 1. Ⅲ to jail that thousands of people will go AW: What do these cases say about on the street marching. I’m afraid that the media in Indonesia today? what will happen is, they will need BH: My worry is about the criminal more of us to go to jail before a reac- case because it represents the cur- Friends of Herrera tion like that happens. … But my worst rent government view on press free- nightmare is if putting us in jail is dom—and clearly their attitude is Eight groups filed friend-of-the-court just enough to make everybody else against press freedom. briefs in the Herrera case. They scared, so there’s no more need to AW: What more can we do to sup- included Article 19, Periodistas, Colegio send anyone else to jail because they port you? de Periodistas de Costa Rica, the have already gained control. And we BH: The most important thing is World Press Freedom Committee, the will be in jail for nothing. pressuring the government. To me, Center For Justice and International AW: So tell me about the impact that the criminalization of the media is Law, the OSI Justice Initiative, and the these cases have had on Tempo. the policy of the government. I Inter American Press Association. BH: We spend a full Monday every mean, I am not worried about civil CPJ’s brief was signed by The week in court … and one case in a year litigation, because, you know, every- Associated Press, CNN, El Comercio, The Hearst Corp., The Miami Herald, might cost us an amount similar to body has a right to civil litigation. Ⅲ one month’s salary for the entire staff. El Nuevo Día, La Prensa, The Reforma AW: Monday is your court day. If it’s For updates on the Harymurti case, Group, Reuters, El Tiempo, and Monday it must be— visit www.cpj.org. Tribune Co.

14 Fall | Winter 2004 Under Siege

From Ashgabat to Washington: A Turkmen correspondent’s journal recounts abduction, assault, and freedom.

By Saparmurad Ovezberdiyev with an introduction by Nina Ognianova Reuters/Shamil Zhumatov

A procession commemorating Turkmenistan’s Independence Day carries a giant portrait of President Saparmurat Niyazov in the central square of the capital, Ashgabat, on October 27, 2002.

aparmurad Ovezberdiyev, 65, a From September 2003 to June introduced himself as the ministry’s correspondent for the U.S. gov- 2004, Turkmenistan’s National Security consular officer. “We want to help. Sernment–funded Radio Free Service (MNB) waged an intensive Come see us today.” Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL), fled his campaign of intimidation against A half-hour later I was in a cab native Turkmenistan in mid-July after Ovezberdiyev. The U.S. Embassy in approaching the ministry. Soldiers years of reprisals for his work. Ashgabat, which had monitored the suddenly appeared to detour our car; A 14-year network veteran, attacks, took an active role in helping another soldier stopped us and Ovezberdiyev reported from the capi- Ovezberdiyev move to Washington, D.C., directed the cabbie to step outside. tal, Ashgabat, about human rights where he continues to work for RFE/RL. In seconds, two unfamiliar men were abuses, unemployment, drug addic- He arrived on July 13 with sons Ravsha sitting on either side of me saying tion, and other problems—topics not and Bakhtiyar. His wife, Oguldurdy, they worked for the MNB. They covered in the state-controlled Turk- has remained in Turkmenistan to take grabbed me by the armpits, shoved men media. Because of government care of her elderly mother. me into a van with tinted windows, persecution, reporters who dare criti- The excerpts below are from his and put a black sack over my head. cize the government use pseudonyms. personal journal, which was written One of them stuck his hand in my But Ovezberdiyev reported under his shortly after his arrival in Washington. breast pocket and pulled out my own name—the only RFE/RL corre- RFE/RL press card. spondent to do so. The Abduction We drove for about 15 minutes My telephone rang at about 2 p.m. on before I felt the van stop and heard Saparmurad Ovezberdiyev now Thursday, September 11, 2003. “Nine gates opening into what I later reports for RFE/RL in Washington, D.C. months ago, you applied to the Min- learned was the courtyard of the Min- Nina Ognianova is researcher for CPJ’s istry of Foreign Affairs for a visa to istry of National Security. The agents Europe and Central Asia Program. go to Moscow,” said the caller, who grabbed me by the armpits and took

Dangerous Assignments 15 me out and up some stairs. I heard drove off. Along the way, one of them the heavy thud of a jail cell door struck me repeatedly on the head while they seated me on an iron bed, with a plastic container filled with took the sack off my head, and started water. They say that such a weapon firing questions at me. The interro- leaves no marks on a victim’s body. gation was on. One of the men said they had dug a They threatened me with 20 years grave to bury me alive, and that’s where in prison for high treason because of we were going. “We are tired of your interviews I’d conducted for RFE/RL in endless broadcasts and radio inter- which I took to the streets of Ashgabat views,” he told me. They pulled out a and talked to regular citizens. They pair of wire cutters, squeezing the said the interviews could cause riots in pinky on my left hand with the tool. Turkmenistan, that their messages “OK, your death is here. Say your contradicted the policies of Turkmen prayers; we are now going to bury you President Saparmurat Niyazov. They alive,” said the other when we had urged me to write a statement confess- stopped. They ripped off my denim ing that I was an enemy of the people. shirt, forcing me out of the car and to RFE/FL/Melody Jones Friday and most of Saturday the ground, where they started beating Saparmurad Ovezberdiyev at work in came and went. The MNB agents told Washington, D.C. me again. Finally, one of them ordered me that an investigator would come me to lie still on the cold ground. from the General Prosecutor’s Office after me at the MNB. But a soldier As I heard the roar of a car driving to open a criminal case, but no one replied brusquely that I was not there, away, I lifted my head and realized ever did. They fed me meagerly: a and that she should go to the police that I was at the Vatutinskoye City dark-colored lump they said was rye department. The police told her to Cemetery. My shirt, shoes, and socks bread; some oily soup; something look in the morgue. were gone; so was my cap. This was they called “partridge grass” tea. On Friday, my son Bakhtiyar con- how I looked as I walked toward the Through the barred window of my tacted the U.S. Embassy in Turkmenistan cemetery gate. cell I could hear a dog barking and and reported that I had disappeared. straining at its chain leash. The embassy interceded, telling the The Blockade At nightfall on Saturday, MNB Ministry of Foreign Affairs it knew The siege began at 9 a.m. on June 18, operatives took me back down to the that an RFE/RL correspondent had 2004. A car with two MNB agents ground floor. An agent told me they been taken, and that the incident stopped at my home, in front of the were driving me back to town, and would cause international publicity. gate leading to a courtyard shared by my family and five others. They turned off my home telephones, One of the men said they had dug a grave to bury leaving me without any means of communication or Internet access. me alive. ‘We are tired of your endless broadcasts For nearly a month, MNB opera- and radio interviews,’ he told me. tives drove up to my house at 6:30 each morning and stayed until mid- night. They changed cars a few times that I should tell my wife I’d spent the Looking back now, I understand why each day. last three nights with a lover. They I never saw the investigator from the The agents stopped everyone at returned my belt, a shoehorn, and prosecutor’s office. our courtyard gate, wrote down their 6,000 manats (about US$1.15). My personal information (name, address, RFE/RL press card was not returned. The Cemetery place of employment), and then While I was away, both of my The blows came from behind, striking refused them entry. Visitors were told home telephones had been turned off, me on the head and back as I was tak- not to return. A few days after the as were my neighbors’ telephones and ing out the trash at my home at about start of the blockade, MNB agents the phones belonging to a neighbor’s 9 a.m. on November 14, 2003. Before went to my wife’s workplace and that business. (I had used those telephones I could turn around, the two men of my eldest son. Both were fired. many times before when the govern- wrapped my denim shirt around my During those days, I received a lot ment shut off mine.) My wife and her head so I could not see their faces. of help from the U.S. Embassy in Turk- relatives, sensing trouble, had inquired Then they pushed me into a car and menistan. In an embassy car, staff

16 Fall | Winter 2004 members drove by the MNB agents and his two sons were going to fly to All this went on for one hour and watching my house, as if reminding the United States, and that any prob- 40 minutes and would have contin- them that the United States was keep- lems arising with the departure would ued if Lufthansa, the German airline ing an eye on the situation and pro- be viewed as an international incident. whose plane would take us to Frank- tecting my family. So we began the check-in proce- furt, had not insisted that it was dures, and our passports were time to depart. When we boarded the The Way out inspected. Several men in plain plane, two U.S. Embassy staff mem- On July 12, 2004, at 11 p.m., my two clothes suddenly arrived and stood bers congratulated us on the safe sons and I arrived with our luggage at behind the customs inspectors, outcome. At 2 a.m. on July 13, they the airport in a U.S. Embassy car reporting something via handheld called U.S. Ambassador Tracey Ann escorted by two embassy staff mem- radios. The customs inspectors pulled Jacobson to report that my two sons bers. A few hours earlier, the U.S. everything from our suitcases: jack- and I had safely boarded the plane. Embassy in Turkmenistan had sent a ets, shoes, socks, all of our clothes. She was awake and, apparently, con- letter to Foreign Affairs Minister Rashid They turned the pockets inside out, cerned about our fate. I said to Meredov stating that RFE/RL corre- checked the liners on each piece of myself: “Good night Madame Ambas- spondent Saparmurad Ovezberdiyev clothing, looked inside the shoes. sador, and long live freedom.” Ⅲ

In Exile

Free from fear, three journalists see challenges and opportunities in their new homes.

By Jennifer Friedlin

harif Shahabuddin recalls his afraid something would happen,” mounting concern after a group Shahabuddin says. Sof men suddenly blocked his Shahabuddin is one of more than car and slammed it with heavy 30 journalists who have sought asy- objects in Bangladesh’s capital, lum and resettled in other countries Dhaka, in March 2003. Then senior during the last three years with the correspondent for the daily news- help of CPJ and its Journalist Assis- paper The News Today, Shahabuddin tance Program. Had they stayed in had angered extremists and trig- their home countries, many of them gered a series of threats with articles would have faced imprisonment, tor- about the growth of Islamic funda- ture, or even death. mentalism and official corruption in Yet despite the safety and free- the country. dom that asylum offers, many of He escaped unharmed that night, these journalists encounter new but his thoughts turned to his wife struggles in their adoptive countries. and teenage son at home. “Every Asylum seekers often have to wait Jennifer Friedlin moment I was in Bangladesh I was extended periods of time before they Bangladeshi journalist Sharif Shahabuddin can secure permission to work, mak- in New York Freelance writer Jennifer Friedlin ing it difficult to survive financially. was formerly a reporter for The Even when newcomers are with their skills and experience. Cul- Jerusalem Post, Reuters, and The allowed to work, they often have tural and language barriers must also Associated Press. difficulty finding jobs commensurate be overcome.

Dangerous Assignments 17 Shahabuddin, Aaron Berhane of Ideally, Shahabuddin would like to Eritrea, and Tin Maung Than of return and help build a democratic Burma are three journalists who have society in Bangladesh, now considered sought asylum in North America one of the most corrupt countries in recently. Their experiences reflect a the world—and one of the most vio- mixture of new opportunities, unex- lent for journalists. The ruling pected hardships, and difficult ques- Bangladesh Nationalist Party has been tions. Here are their stories. responsible for many brutal assaults against journalists, as was its prede- hane

An Eye Back Home: cessor, the Awami League Party. on Ber Sharif Shahabuddin Until the political climate back Traveling to New York with his wife home eases, Shahabuddin says he is tesy Aar Cour and son on a tourist visa in May content to stay in the United States. Eritrean journalist Aaron Berhane in 2003, Shahabuddin decided to apply He is particularly pleased with the Toronto, Canada for political asylum. Eighteen months prospects for his 17-year-old son, later, he remains in New York, where Shafquat Rahman, a junior in high increasingly dictatorial rule, shut- he is still waiting for his case to be school. “In Bangladesh, I had to pay tered the independent press in 2001 approved. He expects it to take up to for Shafquat’s education. Here it’s and began hunting journalists in six more months and several hear- free,” says Shahabuddin, adding their homes. He spent three months ings with an immigration judge proudly, “He has a 96 average.” in hiding before escaping to Sudan. before it is decided. But the news from home is often In August 2002, Berhane received In the meantime, Shahabuddin, bleak: Since January, two of Shahabud- political asylum in Canada. 59, has not been able to work. The din’s friends and colleagues, Manik Berhane, 34, says he enjoys Shahabuddins live in Queens with rel- Saha, a stringer for the BBC, and Toronto’s cultural diversity, but that atives who assist them financially. Humayun Kabir, an editor of the the transition has not been easy. Dur- ing his first year in Canada, he stud- ied English and took a job as a Even as Berhane builds a life in Toronto, he cashier to support himself. longs for the day he can return home to Eritrea, “It was a challenge. A cashier is much lower than my status and reunite with friends and family, and help create capacity, but I had to do it to make a a free society. living,” Berhane says. “I comforted myself by comparing myself to my colleagues who are in Shahabuddin fills his days by watch- daily Dainik Janmabhumi, have been jail,” he recalls. At least 17 Eritrean ing television news, surfing the Inter- killed. Yet even in moments of lone- journalists are imprisoned without net, and keeping a journal that he liness and boredom, Shahabuddin charge, according to CPJ research, plans to turn into a book about his says he feels grateful for the oppor- making Eritrea Africa’s leading jailer experience. tunity to live in the United States. of journalists. On occasion, Shahabuddin writes Along with its deplorable record stories for newspapers back home A Challenging Transition: on human rights, Eritrea’s economic and for local newspapers serving the Aaron Berhane development virtually halted due to Bangladeshi community in New York. Aaron Berhane dreams about return- the devastating 1998-2000 border But, he says, he is careful about what ing to his native Eritrea to continue war with neighboring Ethiopia, as he writes. He does not want to anger the fight for democracy he began as well as the effects of a serious officials in Bangladesh while he is in publisher of the independent news- drought. With no private press and limbo in the United States. paper Setit. “I wish I could go home few international journalists on hand, “When I get asylum, I will have because I was so ambitious,” says very little information emerges from rights and protection, and I will be Berhane, who now lives in Toronto. “I the country. able to fight against the Bangladeshi started the first independent news- For Berhane, this has made it dif- government,” Shahabuddin says. “I paper because I wanted to contribute ficult to continue writing about his can do what I did in the past: fight something to my country.” home country, but he still looks for against the corruption and the Berhane fled after the govern- ways to remain connected. In 2003, he human rights abuses.” ment, under President Isaias Afewerki’s received a fellowship for journalists

18 Fall | Winter 2004 at risk and started auditing classes at Life), a monthly magazine that became “Here I am free and I can speak my the University of Toronto. During a known for using cryptic double enten- mind and I can make any comment on course on screenwriting, Berhane dres to criticize the military regime. any issue,” Tin Maung Than says. began to think about the reach a film After a few years, government “When I began speaking on the radio, could have in Eritrea, where the illit- censors began catching on and crack- it was difficult for me because in eracy rate is high. ing down. Eventually, Tin Maung Burma we have to think about censor- “With a newspaper I could reach Than feared for his life, and in 2000 ship. I got used to saying things with only the people who could read my he, his wife, and their two young double meanings, and here I have to message, and 50 percent of the Eritrean daughters fled across the border to say things directly and to the point.” people are illiterate,” explains Berhane. Thailand. A few months later, they While he enjoys the newfound “In Canada, I realized that by produc- arrived in the United States, where freedom, Tin Maung Than has ing a film I could convey my message they secured asylum. arrived at a professional crossroad. to people who can’t read.” Today, Tin Maung Than, 50, and He no longer wants to continue Knowing that a film critical of the his family live in Rockville, Md., and working solely on issues pertaining Eritrean government would never get are in the midst of applying for per- to Burma, but he does not have the past the censors, Berhane wrote a manent residency. He works as a pol- language skills to work for a U.S. “romantic comedy” about an Eritrean icy analyst for the Burma Fund, a news outlet. woman looking for love in Canada. Washington, D.C.–based organization “I would like to continue my life The script is laced with discreet mes- that promotes democratization in here, but up until now I have sages about the benefits of democracy Burma. He also contributes regularly remained in the past,” Tin Maung and a multiparty political system. to two Burmese-language radio sta- Than explains. “If you want to con- Today, Berhane is trying to raise tions, Radio Free Asia and the Demo- tinue in the United States, you have funds to produce his film while look- cratic Voice of Burma. to cut from your past and live here. ing for money to start a community I’m still living in the past, working newspaper for Eritreans in Toronto, for my country and thinking about who number about 3,100, according the issues related to Burma.” to a 2001 Canadian census. With Burma receding into the back- Yet, even as Berhane builds a life in ground and his journalistic options Toronto, he longs for the day he can limited, Tin Maung Than has recently return home, reunite with friends and begun thinking about taking the med- family, and help create a free and dem- ical licensing exam and returning to his ocratic society. “There is no way I can original career as a doctor. go back until this regime is out of “Compared with other people, I power,” Berhane says. “But once it is have had a comfortable transition to overthrown, I will go back.” in Maung Than life in the United States,” Tin Maung

tesy T Than acknowledges. “But at some A Professional Crossroad:

Cour point, I realized that I didn’t know Tin Maung Than Burmese journalist Tin Maung Than which direction to go.” Ⅲ Exile in the United States has given Tin Maung Than the chance to begin a new chapter in his varied profes- Help for Those in Distress sional life. Trained as a doctor in his native Burma (now called Myanmar CPJ’s Journalist Assistance Program directly intervenes to help journal- by the ruling military junta), Tin ists who find themselves in extreme distress because of their work. Since Maung Than gave up a career in med- its inception three years ago, the program has helped more than 100 icine to become a journalist in the journalists under threat in more than 30 countries worldwide, including late 1980s, after the military Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Belarus, Burma, Colombia, Cuba, Haiti, Liberia, declared martial law in response to a Pakistan, Russia, Rwanda, Sri Lanka, Uzbekistan, and Zimbabwe. democratic uprising. CPJ helps journalists find safe havens, obtain legal counsel, and “I was so occupied with politics, receive medical treatment. The program also arranges medical evacua- and the only way I could communicate tions, provides professional support to journalists resettling in exile, with my people was to publish a mag- and lobbies for journalists’ refugee or asylum status. More than 30 jour- azine,” Tin Maung Than says. He nalists have sought asylum and resettled with CPJ’s help. Ⅲ became the editor of Thintbawa (Your

Dangerous Assignments 19 Glasnost and Now

Repression, censorship, and murder: Russia and other former Soviet republics hurtle backward.

By Ann Cooper AP/Misha Japaridze

Masked, armed police officers raid the offices of the Media-Most holding company in Moscow in May 2000.

TOGLIATTI, Russia time the two bonded in a college ered many crimes and made many alery Ivanov and Aleksei friendship and went on to seek their enemies. On April 22 of that year, Sidorov came of age in a fortunes in the world, the Soviet Ivanov was gunned down in a con- Vworld bursting with possibili- Union was history, Russia’s media tract-style killing outside his home. ties. It was the late 1980s, and a tidal propaganda machines were privatiz- He was 32. Sidorov quickly replaced wave of free speech was sweeping ing, and journalism had become an his slain colleague, boasting that the away the communist dictators who admired, even heroic, profession. paper would continue to investigate had ruled their homeland, the Soviet It was the profession chosen by crime and corruption. After all, Sidorov Union, for decades. Ivanov, founder and editor of Tolyat- told The New York Times, “They can’t For 70 years, the Communist tinskoye Obozreniye, and his friend kill us all.” Party held near absolute control over Sidorov, who became the weekly Eighteen months later, while what Soviet citizens could see, hear, newspaper’s deputy editor. Together Sidorov was returning home from and read. The party buried the dark they practiced a scrappy investiga- work, a man wielding an ice pick secrets of Josef Stalin’s brutal repres- tive journalism previously unknown stabbed him to death. Sidorov was sion. Disgraced leaders such as Nikita in one of post-Soviet Russia’s most 31, a victim of a post-Soviet form of Khrushchev were swiftly airbrushed corrupt cities, the auto manufactur- media control more brutal and out of history, their very existence ing center of Togliatti. absolute than the Communist Party’s denied for decades. The basic factual “The newspaper was set up to censorious Glavlit bureaucracy. The elements of life, such as death tolls conduct investigations, to find polit- Organization for Security and Coop- from natural and man-made disasters, ical, social, and criminal issues and eration in Europe called it “censor- were state secrets. unravel them,” recalls Stella Ivanova, ship by killing.” Then came glasnost, Mikhail Gor- Ivanov’s sister. bachev’s policy of limited free Week after week, the paper illu- hen the Soviet Union collapsed speech, which began to erode the minated the criminal underworld Wnearly 13 years ago, its 15 party’s controls as Ivanov and warring for economic control of republics became independent coun- Sidorov reached adolescence. By the Togliatti and its lucrative auto busi- tries whose leaders at least initially ness. Links between criminal gangs paid lip service to the notion that CPJ Executive Director Ann Cooper and the city’s government were democracy would replace commu- covered the final years of the former exposed; the paper’s reporting on nism, and that state-controlled prop- Soviet Union as Moscow bureau chief local corruption forced one Togliatti aganda would give way to free and for National Public Radio. In June, she mayor from office. independent media. led a mission to Togliatti to press for By 2002, its sixth year of opera- But throughout most of the answers in the slayings of two editors. tion, the crusading paper had uncov- region, tantalizing new freedoms,

20 Fall | Winter 2004 such as the launch of privately regimes in Azerbaijan, Belarus, and known the fears of its parents, dared owned newspapers, have been offset central Asia keep most journalists to ask the hard-liners on a live TV by new repressions. A range of too frightened to report or write broadcast: “Could you please say authoritarian tactics—from state news that conflicts with the official whether or not you understand that control of newsprint and advertising version of events. last night you carried out a coup d’e- to politicized court rulings and In Ukraine, President Leonid tat?” And as tanks surrounded Soviet financial pressures—has stifled or Kuchma has been under fire for four television headquarters, reporter silenced journalists and thwarted the years for his alleged role in the mur- Sergei Medvedev and his bosses at development of vibrant, independ- der and beheading of an investiga- state TV risked all to broadcast a for- ent media. Broadcasting remains tive Internet journalist. Secret bidden report on resistance to the either a state monopoly or subject to recordings made by one of Kuchma’s coup—including the searing image of heavy-handed government influence security guards are said to implicate Boris Yeltsin defiant atop an armored in most former Soviet republics. And the president, who has resisted per- vehicle sent to subdue him. while privately owned newspapers sistent international calls for an That one scene helped bring exist in all but one of the former independent investigation. down the three-day coup. A few republics, Turkmenistan, many of Yet nowhere is the press freedom months later, in December 1991, the these publications face constant gov- struggle more dramatic than in Russia, Soviet Union was history, and a new ernment interference. named by CPJ this year as one of the era seemed to arrive for the Russian As a result, most former Soviet 10 worst places in the world to be a media. “A truly independent press is states lack the press freedom essen- journalist. “In the West, it’s estab- on its way,” Malkina forecast that fall. tial to free and fair elections. These lished that a citizen has a right to Such promises went unfulfilled. countries have few media outlets know, and to get information, and Media privatized but faced huge willing or able to investigate govern- journalists have a right ment corruption aggressively. And to have access to impor- they have little of the transparency tant information and to and accountability necessary to pro- give it to the public,” mote strong economic growth. says Rimma Mikhareva, Research by the Committee to deputy editor of Tolyat-

Protect Journalists shows that of the tinskoye Obozreniye. “I ablokov 15 former Soviet republics, only don’t think this concept three have established strong press exists in Russia.” /Alexei Y freedom conditions: the tiny European eniye states of Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia. n the glasnost era of At the other extreme is Turk- Ithe late 1980s, inde- menistan in central Asia, where a pendent-minded jour- olyattinskoye Obozr

megalomaniacal dictator uses Soviet- nalism was beginning T era tactics to throttle independent to flower in Russia, AP/ sources of information. The president even though the Soviet Tolyattinskoye Obozreniye editors Valery Ivanov (left) appoints newspaper editors; censor- state and the Commu- and Aleksei Sidorov, both of whom were killed for their paper’s hard-hitting coverage ship is enforced; and publishing nist Party continued to houses are under strict state control. own newspapers, printing houses, financial difficulties. Western invest- Unfiltered news comes only from for- and television stations. By August ment encouraged new, independent eign radio broadcasts, and Turkmen 1991, when a group of hard-line publications but was seldom enough citizens say they listen only in the communists tried to overthrow Gor- to sustain them. Those that survived safety of their own homes—just as bachev and his reforms, journalists were likely to rely on one of several they did under Soviet rule. could no longer be counted on as pas- compromising schemes: ownership In between those extremes, the sive propagandists. by oligarchs made rich in shady pri- region’s media struggle desperately Some reporters and editors openly vatization deals who used their with a broad range of problems. defied the putsch. Editors of 11 papers media holdings to promote political Central governments in Georgia, banned by the coup leaders united to agendas; state subsidies that left Armenia, and Moldova are too weak produce an underground newspaper papers beholden to the very inter- to thwart rogue violence against handed out on the streets. Twenty- ests they covered; or the sale of news journalists and too intolerant to four-year-old reporter Tatiana Malkina, space to corporations via contracts countenance criticism. Autocratic from a generation that had not that promised favorable coverage.

Dangerous Assignments 21 Survival has come at the cost of when two top Russian investigative freedom has been nearly erased, and credibility, leaving the Russian public reporters, Andrei Babitsky and Anna journalists’ lives are endangered. ambivalent about the press—even as Politkovskaya, were prevented from Healthy criticism of the Kremlin has criminals attack the few journalists covering the hostage story. On their been silenced as a result, and even who still dare to probe or question. way to Beslan, Babitsky was locked basic information on a catastrophe When American investigative editor up on spurious charges of “hooligan- such as Beslan is hidden from the Paul Klebnikov was gunned down ism,” and Politkovskaya was felled by public. Politkovskaya, writing in the outside the Moscow office of Forbes a mysterious case of poisoning. London-based Guardian newspaper, Russia in July, he became the 11th No one expected Russia’s post- says it all looks sadly familiar. “We journalist to be slain in a contract- communist transition to be smooth are hurtling back into a Soviet style murder since President Vladimir for the media. But almost 13 years abyss,” she says, “into an informa- Putin took office four years ago. No after communism’s collapse, press tion vacuum.” Ⅲ one has been brought to justice in these murders, and the government’s indifference is palpable. At the same time, the Putin Eleven Murders, No Justice administration has muzzled critical reporting. Kremlin-backed restric- Eleven journalists have been killed in contract-style murders since tions made it extremely difficult for Russian President Vladimir Putin took office four years ago, according opposition candidates to be heard to reporting by the Committee to Protect Journalists. No one has been during last year’s parliamentary and brought to justice in any of the slayings. Here are the victims: presidential elections. Military restric- tions have prevented independent reporting on the conflict in Chechnya. And Russian authorities shuttered Chechenskoye Obshchestvo, one of the only independent Chechen newspapers CJES reporting on the conflict, a month Igor Domnikov before the republic’s August elections. Novaya Gazeta July 16, 2000 CJES CJES Under Putin, all national televi- CJES Moscow sion broadcasting has been brought Iskandar Khatloni Eduard Markevich Dmitry Shvets under the direct control or heavy Radio Free Europe/ Novy Reft TV-21 Northwest- influence of the Kremlin. The Radio Liberty September 18, ern Broadcasting September 21, 2001 April 18, 2003 removal last summer of indepen- 2000 Reftinsky Murmansk dent-minded anchors and public Moscow affairs programs, reportedly in Aleksei Sidorov response to Kremlin complaints, Tolyattinskoye reinforced the notion that TV news is Obozreniye

a state enterprise. And while children CJES October 9, 2003 Togliatti died and a middle school burned in a Sergey Novikov

horrific siege in Beslan in September, Radio Vesna emya r viewers of state television were given July 26, 2000 Smolensk a recitation of the government’s 2005 CJES Nashe V privatization plan. Sergey Ivanov Natalya Skryl Even print journalists, who have Lada-TV Nashe Vremya October 3, 2000 March 9, 2002 far smaller audiences, face great risk Togliatti Taganrog in criticizing the Kremlin. In Sep- For updates

tember, after the national daily Izvestia AP/Misha Japaridze on journalist Adam Tepsurgayev Valery Ivanov carried dramatic coverage question- Reuters Tolyattinskoye Paul Klebnikov slayings in ing the government’s handling of the November 21, Obozreniye Forbes Russia Russia, visit Beslan crisis, chief editor Raf 2000 April 29, 2002 July 9, 2004 www.cpj.org. Shakirov was swiftly fired, reportedly Alkhan-Kala Togliatti Moscow because of Kremlin pressure. Krem- lin interference was also alleged

22 Fall | Winter 2004 DISPATCHES

Censoring a Crisis

In western Sudan, where tens of thousands have been killed, neither local nor international media can get the real story.

By Kamel Labidi

n a recent piece on Sudanese Online, journalist Helal Zaher Essadati Ibemoaned the local press’s cover- age of the crisis in Darfur, where more than 50,000 people have been killed and more than 1 million dis- placed in a campaign supported by the Sudanese government. Pro-gov- ernment journalists stay at their “air- conditioned desks in Khartoum,” he wrote, but when independent publi- cations report on the atrocities, they “are banned or suspended and hon- orable journalists and writers are brought to unfair trials.” But not many in Sudan will read

Essadati’s comments, thanks to con- Reuters/Luc Gnago tinuous government efforts to block Sudan Liberation Army members train in western Sudan. the Internet news site inside the coun- try, according to the Sudanese rights Today, what U.N. Secretary-General Darfur became one of the top red- group Sudan Organization Against Kofi Annan has called “the worst lines for the beleaguered Sudanese Torture. This case of censorship is human rights crisis in the world” media in February 2003, when mili- only part of the Sudanese govern- continues, and journalists remain tary groups of African descent created ment’s plan to keep the world from unable to cover the story adequately. the Sudan Liberation Army (SLA) to learning about its systematic cam- counter attacks by Arab, government- paign of attacks, rapes, and murders n Sudan, practicing press freedom backed militias, known as janjaweed. aimed at black Muslims in Darfur. Ihas had a high cost since Gen. Omar The SLA was also protesting the mar- Since Darfur erupted in early al-Bashir overthrew a democratically ginalization of Darfur, a drought- and 2003, authorities in Khartoum have elected government there in June 1989. poverty-stricken region in western waged a two-pronged war against the Under al-Bashir, several topics have Sudan, by Arab leaders in Khartoum. media—jailing, harassing, and cen- been declared off-limits for the media, In the past, skirmishes between farm- soring local journalists while making including internal armed conflicts, the ers of African descent and nomads of travel and reporting for foreign cor- opposition, corruption among high- Arab origin, both Muslim, have erupted respondents almost impossible. ranking officials, and criticism of the from time to time over such issues as president and his top aides. Crossing access to water. But the disagree- Kamel Labidi is a freelance journal- these so-called redlines can be disas- ments were regularly settled through ist based in Egypt and former director trous for journalists, leading to harass- negotiations between their respective of Amnesty International–Tunisia. ment, imprisonment, and torture. leaders. These small clashes erupted

Dangerous Assignments 23 into civil war when the leaders of the Darfur. But few people have the possi- armed conflicts, and poverty.” Musa, main African tribes, Fur, Masalit, and bility to watch Arab satellite TV sta- who has an amputated leg, was Zagawa, realized in early 2003 that tions, such as Al-Jazeera, to get the detained for nearly three weeks in they were targets of an ethnic-cleans- true picture of Darfur.” May 2003 and tortured for writing an ing campaign orchestrated by the And when journalists and others article about the destruction of Khartoum-based government, which do speak critically about the conflict Sudanese air force planes in Darfur prides itself on its Arab origin. in Darfur, they do so at great risk. by the SLA. According to al-Haj Warrag, a When Al-Jazeera’s Khartoum bureau “The detention conditions were manager of the privately owned began airing broadcasts about the extremely painful and degrading. Not daily Al-Sahafa, today there are nearly devastation in Darfur, authorities only did they inflict physical torture 17 redlines that Sudanese editors harassed and detained bureau chief on you, but they enormously hurt you and reporters must not cross. Editors Islam Salih, who was eventually sen- by denying you the right to see your often receive phone calls from secu- tenced to one month in prison. In kids and wife for weeks,” he says. rity officials instructing them not to July, a high-ranking government offi- Musa believes that what happened to criticize President al-Bashir, the cial threatened to shutter the inde- him at the hands of the police was influential and feared Vice President pendent newspaper Al-Ayyam because meant to spread fear and self-censor- Ali Osman Mohamed Taha, the ubiq- of its critical coverage of the Darfur ship among Sudanese journalists. uitous security forces, or the gov- crisis, says al-Abbasi. “Editors are But rather than stopping the free ernment-controlled judicial system. constantly warned against the high flow of information, these increased Journalists are also asked not to cost of ignoring these instructions attacks on the media seem to have report on human rights violations, and are afraid of being accused of widened the circle of press freedom to turn a blind eye to armed con- hurting the country’s interests and defenders in Sudan. The leading fig- flicts, and to print only pro-govern- facing the consequences of the gov- ure of these press freedom advo- ment news. ernment’s anger,” she says. cates, Mahjoub Mohamed Salah, has In July, the online Sudanese left- The government regularly denies earned a reputation for fighting for ist paper Al-Midan ran a confidential Sudanese journalists the right to independent journalism for nearly letter from the security forces leader- investigate large-scale massacres of five decades. Salah has been arrested, ship to a group of journalists and villagers and help identify those who and his paper, Al-Ayyam, suspended editors close to the government burned houses and farms, raped and confiscated several times during titled “Instructions on How the Media women and girls, and forced hun- the last few years. Should Tackle the Darfur Sedition,” dreds of thousands of farmers and Salah was last arrested on May 4 what the government calls the oppo- their families into exile in neighboring because he had established a com- sition in Darfur. The letter stressed Chad. Meanwhile, reports Amnesty mittee to defend press freedom and the importance of tarnishing the International, it is “impossible” for oppose a restrictive draft press law image of what it called “the exiled foreign journalists “to work freely in submitted to Parliament by President leading figures known for their hos- Darfur.” Initially, international corre- al-Bashir. Salah and four other press tility to the nation” and of warning spondents had to travel to Chad to get freedom advocates were arrested that foreign intervention in Darfur the story from refugees. Now, acquir- while on their way to give a memo- would turn Sudan into “a home to ing a visa to Sudan is extremely diffi- randum signed by more than 200 extremists more dangerous than cult, and once journalists do, they journalists to the Parliament. Afghanistan and Iraq.” The letter also remain under the tight surveillance of Their arrests did not prevent urged these journalists to attack a “government minder.” And those other journalists from taking the Western governments for “being Sudanese citizens who dare speak to memorandum to Parliament or from unfair and relying on biased reports journalists about their plight have making it clear that only a free press and false information.” faced government harassment. can heal the country’s deep wounds The result of this kind of pressure and problems—especially those in has been evident in local coverage of udanese journalist Yusif al-Bashir Darfur. They believe that the carnage the Darfur crisis. “Only the govern- SMusa has been detained seven in Darfur “could have been averted,” ment’s side of the story appears in times and tortured since he began says Magdi al-Naim, a Sudanese print and is broadcast by the state- his perilous and unstable career in researcher and director of the Cairo- controlled radio and television,” says 1990. But he still believes that he has based Institute for Human Rights Raja al-Abbassi, a Sudanese journalist no other choice but to cross “unac- Studies, “had the Sudanese authori- based in Cairo. “Most people are kept ceptable redlines” and help his coun- ties refrained from stifling press in the dark as far as the situation in try “turn the page of autocratic rule, freedom.” Ⅲ

24 Fall | Winter 2004 NEWSMAKERS

Border Busters

In Armenia and Azerbaijan, journalists overcome government restrictions and old biases to promote a new dialogue.

By Amanda Watson-Boles

YEREVAN, Armenia the fears and animosities of their peo- Yet even as they engage, some here are no direct flights from ple. Azerbaijani officials use outright journalists are skeptical that their here to Baku, Azerbaijan, less intimidation, closures, and imprison- efforts will ever overcome deep-seated Tthan 300 miles away. Getting ment against the press. In Armenia, hatreds; Nagorno-Karabakh is such an there requires a stopover in neigh- authorities control the media through inflammatory issue that journalists in boring Tblisi, Georgia, or even ownership, regulation, and other both countries compare it to the Moscow, more than 1,000 miles to more subtle pressures. Israeli-Palestinian conflict. the north. Despite these restrictions and the That’s why cooperation is essen- The travel gymnastics are not sur- bitter, decades-long divide between tial, even if the benefits are a long way prising. In 1924, the Soviet Union cre- the two countries, some journalists off, says John Boit, regional director ated the Nagorno-Karabakh for the Southern Caucasus at the Autonomous Region in western nonprofit media training organ- Azerbaijan. As more Azerbaijanis ization Internews. “Fair informa- populated the majority ethnic tion has the power to make us Armenian region and the Soviet change our perception and to empire began collapsing, make rational decisions,” he says, Nagorno-Karabakh’s desire for “while unfair information rein- independence led to war in 1988. forces stereotypes, stirs up anger, Nagorno-Karabakh fought with and leads to stupid decisions.” backing from Armenia, and Azer- baijan lost 20 percent of its land. A ‘bridge’ to the future A cease-fire was signed in Journalists on both sides call 1994, but not before 30,000 died the current situation a “frozen and nearly 1 million fled. Today, conflict” because the 1994 Armenian troops control cease-fire merely suspended Nagorno-Karabakh and the sec- fighting. Armenian President tion of Azerbaijan that separates Robert Kocharian approved the region from Armenia, though bor- from Armenia and Azerbaijan are military maneuvers in Nagorno- der skirmishes remain frequent. working together in small yet Karabakh to take place in August. In At the same time, governments in remarkable ways to promote more July, Azerbaijani President Ilham both countries have sought to control thorough and balanced coverage. Aliyev said his country would “never the news media, manipulating them Satellite links are bridging the border make any compromises” in its stance to serve their political ends and stoke to connect journalists with news- that Nagorno-Karabakh belongs solely makers. A radio station is taking on to Azerbaijan. Amanda Watson-Boles is CPJ’s senior urgent political topics and gaining Amid these tensions, local press editor. This article is based on a June popularity. A Web site has drawn clubs here and in Baku organize joint 2004 trip to Yerevan, Armenia, and dozens of journalists to promote a satellite press conferences known as Baku, Azerbaijan. civic and civil dialogue. “bridges,” during which journalists from

Dangerous Assignments 25 both countries interview politicians Director Shushanik Arevshatyan cred- and government leaders, discuss the its its mix of music and talk shows in news, and then report what they which audience members discuss learn in their own media. “hot topics.” One weekly program— Yerevan Press Club President Boris heard by listeners from Yerevan to Navasardian, who helps run the satel- Baku to Tblisi—covers controversial lite bridges, says journalists “get direct cross-regional issues, including and visible access to the sources of Nagorno-Karabakh. information from the other side and Armenia’s National Commission exchange opinions on hot problems.” of Television and Radio Broadcast has When the satellite program was refused the station a license to broad- launched in December 2002, journal- cast outside Yerevan. Officials give no ists’ reactions were virulently nation- explanation, although Arevshatyan dian alistic. “In the beginning,” Navasar- notes that Radio Van’s programs don’t dian says, “journalists came to the follow the government line. satellite conferences and argued Yet Radio Van, which broadcasts tesy Boris Navasar with the people they were interview- from a decrepit downtown building Cour ing.” But then they began to under- here, demonstrates the power of the Boris Navasardian, president of the Internet in reaching larger audiences. Yerevan Press Club The station streams its broadcasts on the Web so listeners beyond the and Georgia registered with the pro- Armenian capital get its programs. gram to publicize their work online During the talk programs, and connect with their colleagues. Arevshatyan says, journalists and lis- Laura Baghdasaryan, a journalist teners in all three countries discuss originally from Tblisi, Georgia, runs issues such as the environment, gen- the program. She has not run into der inequity, minority rights, and the government interference because, she military. Through these shows, she says, the work is “quite nonpolitical.” hopes to “fill the existing informa- The Web site gives equal emphasis tional vacuum” that lies between the to opposition and pro-government countries. It seems to be working: media. Journalists working in the net- The cross-national broadcasts are work agree to what she calls “the among the station’s most popular. golden rules of journalism”—uphold- “Our programs point to a great ing ethics and avoiding corruption necessity of establishing this link and manipulation of information. AP/Photolur between these two nations,” As a result, Baghdasaryan acknowl- Armenian soldiers perform military maneuvers in Nagorno-Karabakh in Arevshatyan says. edges, the work is not radical, “but we August 2004. do contribute to the process” of coop- Direct from the Web eration. With Nagorno-Karabakh “sus- stand that they “were there to get as Journalists across the Caucasus pended between war and peace,” she much information as possible,” not engage in online forums and inter- says, the program provides a way for to advocate their country’s position. view experts and government officials Armenian and Azerbaijani journalists He says the satellite program has on www.caucasusjournalists.net, a to get direct and accurate information been a valuable tool—but at US$2,000 Web site launched by the Yerevan- about each other—something that is per hour, cost is a severe limitation. based Region Centre. Since its incep- in short supply. “Common people in “We find it very important that such tion in 2003, journalists have “con- these countries have no idea what ‘bridges’ take place every few months,” ducted more than 20 cross-border happens in other countries,” she says, says Navasardian, “but we do not interviews with newsmakers in the “so journalists contribute by getting always have enough finances for it.” region,” according to the Eurasia information exchanges started.” Foundation, which provides financial ‘Hot topic’ radio support. Many of these have been A cross-border collaboration Five years after its inception, Yerevan- published in regional media outlets. Shahin Rzayev, project manager for based Radio Van has become the most The Web site also allows the 152 the Baku office of the London-based popular station in its market. Station journalists from Armenia, Azerbaijan, Institute for War and Peace Reporting

26 Fall | Winter 2004

(IWPR), traveled to Armenia with he says. But he admits that, “Working Armenians are killers?” he asks with other Azerbaijani journalists in 1997 together becomes more and more some pessimism. and 2004 to meet with politicians, dependent on the politics. It’s a polit- Yet he continues his work. Rzayev political scientists, and journalists. ical decision.” and IWPR project manager in Armenia, “Armenian journalists are very And Rzayev openly wonders how Karen Topchyan, are collaborating on open when we talk about professional much influence they have. Most pieces about intermarriage between issues … and when we forget about Azerbaijanis get their news from Armenians and Azerbaijanis and politics and history,” Rzayev says. government-controlled television, business dealings between the two For IWPR’s Web site, he has collabo- where the coverage fuels pro-war countries. “All we need is trust rated often with Armenian journalist sentiments. “How can we overcome between journalists,” he says, “and Mark Grigorian to cover stories of the local TV stations saying that good reporting.” Ⅲ concern to both countries, such as the March 2000 arrest of a journalist by Nagorno-Karabakh authorities Controlling the News and the March 2001 peace talks between the two countries. Grigorian has suffered for this After emerging from the Soviet era of opposition newspapers are denied work. In October 2002, he was seri- absolute government control, media access to the state printing house ously wounded by shrapnel when an in Armenia and Azerbaijan remain and distribution system. attacker threw a grenade at him in far from free. Government tactics to control the downtown Yerevan. At the time, In Azerbaijan, authorities have press in Armenia are more subtle. In Grigorian was working on an article hamstrung independent and opposi- a country where 85 percent of the about the October 1999 attack on the tion publications with dozens of population gets its news from televi- Armenian Parliament, during which crippling defamation lawsuits, while sion, authorities have consolidated eight high-level politicians, including the government asserts total control control over this medium by denying the prime minister, were killed. He over broadcast media outlets, either a broadcast license to Armenia’s only believes that he was also targeted for directly or indirectly, through the independent channel, A1+. Boris the “mild and peaceful position” he National Broadcasting Council, Navasardian, president of the Yere- takes on the Nagorno-Karabakh issue. whose nine members are appointed van Press Club, explains that opposi- Grigorian has since moved to by the president. The council has the tion politicians do appear on TV talk London, where he continues to work authority to license and regulate pri- shows, but “the government decides with his Azerbaijani counterparts. vate broadcasters and can petition the dose.” “These contacts are good because courts to suspend an outlet’s license In April 2004, when thousands of professionals can find each other,” for up to two months if it violates opposition supporters filled the broadcasting laws. streets to call for a referendum on Journalists in Azerbaijan also face President Robert Kocharian’s rule, the imprisonment and violent attacks. government tightened restrictions on When demonstrations erupted to news coverage, according to Navasar- protest the October 2003 elections, dian. On top of the clampdown, police widely viewed as fraudulent, several and Kocharian partisans assaulted journalists were beaten. One, Rauf dozens of journalists covering the ral- Arifoglu, editor of Azerbaijan’s lies, severely injuring some. largest opposition newspaper, Yeni Armenia’s printed press suffers Musavat, is being tried for allegedly less government interference because organizing antigovernment protests. only 3 to 5 percent of the population Many journalists believe that Arifoglu’s reads newspapers, says Tigran detention and trial came in retalia- Avetisyan, a reporter at the daily tion for his strong criticism of Presi- Aravot. However, political parties or dent Ilham Aliyev and his govern- businessmen own most publications, ment. Senior officials have also filed so papers are likely to reflect those tesy Shahin Rzayev numerous civil defamation lawsuits interests rather than present objec- Cour that may bankrupt Yeni Musavat. tive reporting. Ⅲ Shahin Rzayev, project manager for the Making matters more difficult, many Baku office of the London-based Institute — Amanda Watson-Boles for War and Peace Reporting

Dangerous Assignments 27 CORRESPONDENTS

‘Rebellion’ for Press Freedom

In the Democratic Republic of Congo, the press freedom group Journaliste en Danger defends and advocates.

By Julia Crawford

KINSHASA, Democratic Republic one, into a courtyard to meet him General Tshivis Tshivuadi, journalists of Congo and two CPJ representatives. The by trade, have been in danger them- t’s visiting time at Centre Péniten- journalists complain that there is no selves for what they have reported. tiaire et de Réeducation, and long due process, that conditions are Ilines of women in colorful head- unsanitary. Before Mushizi leaves, he n May 1997, Tshivuadi was forced to scarves are waiting to bring food to visits the prison director, who prom- Iflee Kinshasa and spend six months relatives being held in this dirty, ises to move the sick journalist to in hiding because of an article he crowded prison. better facilities. But it will take a wrote in Le Phare (The Lighthouse), Charles Mushizi is there, too, as stream of follow-up letters from JED the Kinshasa-based daily where he he is every week to visit jailed jour- before the journalist, Albert Kassa was deputy editor. The article accused nalists. Mushizi is legal adviser to the Khamy Mouya, is finally granted a former President Laurent Kabila, who Congolese press freedom group Jour- provisional release. had just seized power, of trying to cre- naliste en Danger (JED), and on this This is the kind of hard, persistent ate an ethnic army similar to that of Sunday in June five journalists are in work that JED does every day in this the ousted dictator Mobutu Sese Seko. jail, including three new arrivals who central African nation where journal- Le Phare’s editor was arrested the next day, beaten, and tortured, while secu- rity agents came hunting for Tshivuadi. Formed six years ago during the brutal regime When he went into hiding, he says, his family was left without resources, of former President Laurent Kabila, JED provides not knowing where he was. legal and practical help to journalists in danger “It made me realize we needed an organization to defend journalists and presses for government reform. and to protect them,” says Tshivuadi. So M’baya and Tshivuadi began working from a small, unmarked have been put in “preventive” deten- ists still face violence, harassment, office with just a secretary, writing tion for allegedly defaming local dig- and imprisonment. Formed six years stories by hand to publicize and nitaries. One journalist, a diabetic, is ago during the brutal regime of for- protest attacks on the press. JED sick from the poor diet and unsani- mer President Laurent Kabila, JED gained international stature in tary conditions at the prison. provides legal and practical help to October 1999, when it became a Mushizi pushes his way through journalists in danger and presses for member of the Canada-based Inter- the crowded paths of the prison, and government reform. national Freedom of Expression the journalists are brought, one by “Setting up JED was a kind of Exchange (IFEX), which transmits rebellion against the systematic JED’s alerts around the world. IFEX Julia Crawford, CPJ’s Africa Program arrests, beatings, and censorship of Outreach Coordinator Kristina Stock- coordinator, led a two-week mission to the press,” says Donat M’baya Tshi- wood calls JED “indispensable.” the Democratic Republic of Congo in manga, JED’s president since its “Since they have been on the June 2004. inception. M’baya and JED Secretary- ground, we have an incredibly reliable

28 Fall | Winter 2004 and credible source of information right. No, no, the journalist is covering cases we otherwise wouldn’t wrong to denounce corruption, hear about,” Stockwood says. “Seeing wrong to denounce human rights information going out of the country abuses, wrong to criticize those and coming back on the international with political power, to talk about newswires has also had a good impact the security situation in the east of on the DRC authorities.” the country or contradict the official The uncertainty and danger of version put out by the government. JED’s work was highlighted in January Our judicial system is far from inde- d 2001, when its leaders were forced pendent, and I think it’s a big danger underground after Laurent Kabila’s for this country.” government accused them of work- While JED believes that no jour- ing for Rwandan-backed rebels. The CPJ/Julia Crawfor nalist should be jailed for his or her charge was as good as a death sen- JED President Donat M’baya work, it is concerned about the qual- Tshimanga tence in a country at war with its east- ity of journalism in the DRC. “Many ern neighbors; security agents came of the cases we have seen of journal- hunting for them. It was only after ists arrested and imprisoned are Kabila was assassinated later that because they don’t always respect month, and his son Joseph became their code of ethics,” says Tshivuadi. president, that JED reopened. “There are many journalists who Now M’baya and Tshivuadi have a have not been to training schools to team of five people working for learn how to collect, process, and them, and the JED logo adorns the distribute information.” office entrance for all to see. Their M’baya and Tshivuadi are step- friends include major international ping up JED’s training efforts, partic- and African press freedom groups, ularly in the run-up to next year’s something they believe helps protect elections, the DRC’s first democratic them from arrest. Under Joseph poll since independence in 1960. For Kabila, the DRC has signed on to a example, a recent workshop with peace process leading to democratic journalists and politicians covered elections in 2005; the country’s tran- the dangers of “hate media,” a perva- sitional constitution guarantees sive concern with anti-Rwanda and press freedom, though officials do antiforeigner propaganda still rife in not always respect that guarantee. the Congolese press. Attacks on the press remain fre- While pushing for higher profes- d quent, as evidenced by the threats, sional standards, JED is also focusing assaults, and imprisonment of several on governmental reform. Any recent journalists since Rwandan-backed gains in press freedom, M’baya says, rebels briefly took control of the CPJ/Julia Crawfor must be seen in light of one stark eastern city of Bukavu in June. JED Secretary-General Tshivis fact: Not a single law has been passed Tshivuadi But now, says Tshivuadi, “no case to guarantee the public’s right to of an attack on the press can go unno- know, or to protect journalists from ticed. People will know as soon as a criminal liability. journalist is imprisoned, for example. judicial system,” M’baya says. “If “We have seen all the authorities, And that pressure contributes enor- you have no money, you will never we’ve asked them to draft a law that mously to getting them released.” win in the courts. Journalists are would show they want to change weak; they have no money. And as things and that they are different ED is also asserting itself now soon as someone brings a charge from the old regime,” he says. “They Jpolitically, leading a campaign to against a journalist, the first thing is say they came to chase away dicta- remove criminal penalties for press that the judge gets them arrested torship, that they came to install a “offenses” and denouncing abuses and sent to prison. democratic regime. But they continue of the judicial system. “The biggest “If a journalist denounces a case to rule using the laws of that dicta- danger to the democracy we are try- of corruption, the courts don’t even torship. And we think that is a con- ing to build here in Congo is our try to find out if the journalist is tradiction.” Ⅲ

Dangerous Assignments 29 ON THE WEB

Without a Net

An online journalist endures brutal imprisonment in Tunisia—and lives to post again.

By Amanda Watson-Boles

PARIS, France out political humor and critiques that year, when he posted an open letter ack in 2001, Zouhair Yahyaoui can be seen most everywhere around written by his uncle, a judge, who was like many other young col- the world except his own country. criticized the lack of judicial inde- Blege-educated men in Tunisia— pendence in Tunisia. Days later, on unemployed. Then 33, Yahyaoui ince Tunisian President Zine El- June 2, government security officers launched a Web site, the online Internet SAbidine Ben Ali assumed power in descended on the Internet café in forum TUNeZINE, in July of that year 1987, the government has used rigid Tunis where Yahyaoui worked on his using the alias “ettounsi,” or “Tunisian” censorship to stamp out almost site and arrested him. in Arabic. The site soon gained a repu- every voice of dissent. The Internet He was quickly charged and con- tation for its biting satire and political had been an exception for a time, but victed of intentionally publishing commentary, and along with it came even that came under increasing false information and using stolen scores of young readers. repression—a fact Yahyaoui came to communication lines to post TUNeZINE. Thus began an arduous journey know all too well. In July, an appeals court confirmed that led Yahyaoui through Tunisia’s By mid-2002, Yahyaoui’s TUNeZINE the verdict but reduced his initial 28- politicized judicial system and into its had attracted the government’s atten- month prison sentence to 24 months. When Yahyaoui was arrested, offi- cers tortured him during interroga- He doesn’t look like a crusading journalist. tion. He recalls how he was hung from the ceiling, naked except for a Quiet with slightly unkempt curly hair and pair of underwear, and beaten. He dressed in a tan blazer, he seems more like a was kicked, slapped, and punched. Conditions in prison were poor: rotten young professor. food, dirty cells, bad health care. To protest, the journalist waged about 10 hunger strikes, totaling 105 of the brutal prisons. His fate, as one of the tion. Yahyaoui regularly published 531 days he spent behind bars. first Internet journalists to be perse- outspoken articles by independent He also fought his mistreatment cuted for his work, drew worldwide journalists and human rights by getting as much information attention that finally won his release. activists criticizing the government. about prison conditions to the out- Today, he’s back home in Tunis, He published an online poll satiriz- side world as possible. Each Thurs- Tunisia’s capital, again publishing on ing a 2002 referendum, largely day, he would visit briefly with his the Internet, avoiding government viewed as illegitimate, in which mother and sisters—the only family censors as best he can, and churning 99.52 percent of voters approved members allowed to see him—and constitutional changes allowing Ben tell them what he could before the Amanda Watson-Boles is CPJ’s senior Ali to run for an unprecedented guards cut him off. The women would editor. This profile is based on an fourth term. return home and call Yahyaoui’s interview with Yahyaoui in Paris in But Yahyaoui went too far for the fiancée, who lives in Paris, to report June 2004. government’s tastes in May of that what they had heard from him. She

30 Fall | Winter 2004 would then publish Yahyaoui’s Internet journalist and human rights of the sharp wit so evident in accounts online immediately. activist Sihem Bensedrine, also of Yahyaoui’s writing is apparent as he But publicizing his plight only Kalima, when she exited her home in talks softly, sipping a beer and made some guards more relentless, Tunis. Web censors have banned smoking cigarettes. But as he Yahyaoui says. In late March 2002, he Kalima inside Tunisia, and the gov- recounts his imprisonment, his was placed, naked, in solitary con- ernment has also forbidden the pub- resolve becomes apparent. finement for two days. His response? lication from printing hard copies. Though he continues to publish Another hunger strike after he was With attacks mounting, U.S. Pres- TUNeZINE, things are far from easy. released from confinement. ident George W. Bush spoke of “the Thanks to the international pressure His persistence won him admirers need to have a press corps that is that spurred his release, Yahyaoui in prison. “Some prisoners who vibrant and free” when Ben Ali hasn’t suffered government harass- shared my room called me ‘Bouna,’ visited the White House in February ment since being freed. Instead, or ‘Our Father,’” he recalls, authorities have targeted because it was thanks to his family, cutting their his hunger strikes that he phone lines, arresting his and other prisoners even- brother twice, and trying tually had running water to force one of his aunts and fresh bread. Some out of his mother’s house. prison guards also He says he sometimes respected Yahyaoui, “even can’t connect to such ser- if they had to hide it from vices as Yahoo! Mail and others,” he says. “They Google news because of always repeated the same government blocks, and phrase to me: ‘I would like at times he must change to help you, but I have a e-mail hosts to evade gov- family to feed.’” ernment censors. He uses Yahyaoui was finally proxies to ensure that his freed on November 18, e-mails are untraceable. 2003, after an intensive Despite the hardship, new and long-term interna- postings appear on TUNeZINE tional campaign on the every day, though the site journalist’s behalf. Tunisian is blocked inside Tunisia. officials said they released These days, all of him because he had served Yahyaoui’s energies are ahyaoui half his sentence, although focused on TUNeZINE, Yahyaoui points out that which doesn’t bring home he had served consider- any money. But, he says, “I tesy Zouhair Y ably more. always agreed to work Cour Even with Yahyaoui’s whatever job assures me Tunisian Internet journalist Zouhair Yahyaoui spent freedom secured, the situ- 18 months in prison. independence in the face ation remained dire in of dictatorship.” Tunisia. In fact, the day As the fall elections near, he was released, Internet journalist 2004, according to the Los Angeles Yahyaoui is concerned that the gov- Naziha Rejiba, who edits the online Times. Despite Bush’s words, little ernment will begin cracking down on Tunisian publication Kalima, received has changed. dissent. “The regime of Ben Ali tries an eight-month suspended prison to snuff out our voices and to under- sentence on spurious charges of vio- itting in a café in Paris, where he mine our will. … I am very pes- lating currency exchange laws. CPJ Sis visiting his fiancée, Yahyaoui simistic.” But he will continue to pub- research suggests that Rejiba was doesn’t look like a crusading jour- lish his site. “Since few people use targeted for criticizing the govern- nalist. He is quiet, timid, even nervous. their right to free expression in ment’s human rights record. With slightly unkempt curly hair Tunisia,” he says, “it is necessary On January 5, 2004, an assailant and a tan blazer, he seems more that someone shows them that it is believed to be working with the state like a young professor than the sea- possible—providing he pays the security services attacked prominent soned activist he has become. None price, of course.” Ⅲ

Dangerous Assignments 31 KICKER n Illustration: Mick Ster

32 Fall | Winter 2004