When the army ousted Morsi on 3 July, Reporters Without Borders urged the new interim government to respect its initial route map by quickly moving to “a new constitution that fully respects human rights, including freedom of information, and to free and democratic presidential and parliamentary elections with respect for pluralism.”

Since 3 July, a total of five journalists have been killed, 80 journalists have been arbitrarily detained (with seven still held) and at least 40 news providers have been physically attacked by the police or by pro-Morsi or pro-army demonstrators.

These violations of freedom of information have taken place in a highly polarized political environment that has made the situation extremely difficult and dangerous for journalists.

Reporters Without Borders said it condemns the climate of violence and political persecution in which both local and foreign journalists now have to operate in Egypt.

“It is unacceptable that journalists are continually being targeted,” Reporters Without Borders said. “Reporters must be able to work without their lives being put in danger, regardless of the political fault lines. We deplore the passivity of the new Egyptian authorities and we urge them to react quickly by taking concrete measures to guarantee journalists’ safety and respect for freedom of information.”

Reporters Without Borders points out that media coverage of the events taking place in Egypt is essential for understanding the complexity of the situation on the ground.

Meanwhile, Egyptian security forces continue to detain and harass journalists working for news outlets critical of the military-led government, particularly Al-Jazeera and its affiliates, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists(CPJ) . Journalists also still face physical threats from protesters, as tensions persist between the government and supporters of ousted President Mohamed Morsi.

The Ministry of Investment on Thursday August 29, 2013 said it would ban Al-Jazeera Mubashir, the network’s Egyptian affiliate, because it lacked the required legal permits, according to news reports. The statement accused the channel of “spreading lies and rumors damaging to Egyptian national security and unity.” Today, the Ministry of Interior issued a statement saying it had confiscated two broadcasting cars and equipment from Al-Jazeera Mubashir.

On Tuesday August 27, Egyptian security forces detained without charge four staff of Al-Jazeera English, including correspondent Wayne Hay, cameraman Adil Bradlow, and producers Russ Finn and Baher Mohammed, the station reported. Al-Jazeera Arabic correspondent Abdullah al-Shami and Al-Jazeera Mubashir cameraman Mohamed Bader had been arrested earlier this month while covering protests and held under charges of “threatening national security” and “possessing weapons,” respectively.

Six of the 10 journalists in custody in Egypt are from Al-Jazeera and its affiliates, according to CPJ research.

Republished by HRW.org

Facebook issued its first transparency report, surprising no one in saying that the US government has made more requests for user data than any other country. US surveillance practices are only one of the reasons the country leads the pack: Facebook is also based in the US, as are many of its users.

More troubling, however, is that Facebook’s report, which covers the first half of 2013, named the Indian government as making the second most requests, with 3,245 in total. While India is one of Facebook’s fastest growing markets, this is over four times the number Brazil made in the same period, which has a comparable number of Facebook users. India has used its laws to arrest people for posting comments critical of its government on social media. Given this record, both Facebook and the government need to be more transparent regarding the nature of these requests.

The numbers for the UK, Germany, Italy, France, and Brazil are also high. Notably, Facebook complied with less than 40 percent of requests from Germany, France, and Brazil. Users in these countries should be asking why these requests were rejected: Were they overbroad or vague? Did the government not follow privacy laws?

Considering the current controversy over US surveillance practices, the US numbers say less than they seem. The US government only allows companies to reporton national security requests when lumped in with ordinary law enforcement requests. This limitation inhibits real debate as to whether the surveillance practices of the US are proportional or justified. In July, we called on the US government to remove these limitations and increase transparency.

Sunlight is the best disinfectant for government abuses and Facebook (and its peers) have taken a great first step in issuing these reports. In the future, we’d love to see the same data on government requests to Facebook that would restrict freedom of expression. As a member of the Global Network Initiative, Facebook should also explain how it minimizes the harm to privacy in cases where it does comply with a request.

Ultimately, governments should follow suit and be more transparent about how they enlist tech companies in surveillance efforts. And citizens should be asking their governments to justify why they need so much information about users’ Facebook activities – and show that they are protecting the right to privacy.

“I deplore the deaths of Ahmed Abdel Gawad, Mosab Al-Shami and Tamer Abdel Raouf,” said the Director-General of the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), Irina Bokova, calling on Egyptian authorities “to do everything possible to ensure the security of media workers.”

Ms. Bokova expressed her distress and concern over the violence directed against the media in Egypt, where five media professionals have been killed while carrying out their duties in the span of a few days.

According to Reporters Without Borders, Mr. Gawad, a reporter for the Egyptian daily Al-Akhbar, and Mr. Al-Shami, a photojournalist for Rassd News Network, were killed on 14 August while covering demonstrations in the capital, Cairo. Both died from gunshot injuries.

Mr. Raouf was the regional director of Egypt’s Al-Ahram newspaper. He was shot dead at a vehicle checkpoint in Damanhur, in the Beheira Governorate in northern Egypt, on 19 August. Another journalist in the car, Hamed Al-Barbari, was injured.

Ms. Bokova also condemned yesterday the murder of Pakistani journalist Haji Abdul Razzak and Guatemalan journalist Carlos Alberto Orellana Chávez.

Mr. Razzak, 35, was a reporter for the Urdu-language newspaper Daily Tawar. His mutilated body was found in the city of Karachi last Wednesday. He had been reported missing since 24 March.

A broadcast journalist in Guatemala, Mr. Orellana Chávez hosted a news programme on Optimo 23 cable television after having directed Radio Victoria for over 25 years. According to Reporters Without Borders, he was shot down as he was driving to work some 50 kilometres from Mazatenango, the provincial capital of Suchitepequez, in the south of the country.

Ms. Bokova called on Pakistani and Guatemalan authorities “to do all in their power” to investigate the killings and shed light on these heinous crimes.

Security personnel at Dubai international airport told Fouda on 28 June he was banned from leaving the country. In response to a summons, he reported to the state security department on 3 July accompanied by an Egyptian consular official, who left without him.

His relatives have not heard from him since then. Before going to the meeting, Fouda told colleagues he was worried about the outcome.

“We urge the UAE authorities to quickly explain why they arrested Fouda and why they are holding him incommunicado,” Reporters Without Borders said. “If no charges have been brought against him, he must be released unconditionally at once. We hold the state security department, the last place he was seen, responsible for what happens to him.”

After saying nothing for weeks in the hope that he was going to be freed, Fouda’s family have finally gone public about his detention. The responses have included the creation of a Facebook page calling for his release.

A senior editor with the MBC media group, Fouda works with various news media including Al-Arabiya and Al-Aswaq.net and keeps a blog on Egyptian politics.

“Governments don’t have the right to shut down news outlets just because they dispute the accuracy of a story,” said CPJ’s Middle East and North Africa Coordinator Sherif Mansour. “The Hamas government should immediately allow Al-Arabiya and Maan to resume their operations.”

Ismail Jaber, the attorney general, said the outlets reported “fabricated news” that “threatened civil peace and damaged the Palestinian people and their resistance” to Israel, according to a statement published by the Hamas government’s media office today. Jaber described the shutdown as temporary, although the order did not specify when the offices will be allowed to resume operations.

Maan, headquartered in the West Bank, and Al-Arabiya, based in Saudi Arabia, often carry critical coverage of Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood.

The Hamas statement cited an article that Maan published on Wednesday that said Muslim Brotherhood leaders had fled to Gaza to organize activities in support of ousted Egyptian president, Mohamed Morsi. The article cited Israeli sources. In a report on Maan’s website, Nasser Lahham, the agency’s editor-in-chief, stood by the agency’s story.

The statement did not specify a particular Al-Arabiya article, but The New York Times said that Al-Arabiya had reported a similar story. Al-Arabiya said on Thursday that security forces had told its staff that anyone who tried to work in the office would be arrested.

Hamas authorities also shut down Lens, a local Palestinian media production company, on Thursday, according to news reports. The New York Times cited an anonymous Lens employee who said that the Hamas government had shut it down because it allegedly worked with i24, a new Israeli satellite station launched this month looking to emulate the success of global broadcasters like Al-Jazeera. Palestinian journalists in Gaza are barred from working with Israeli media.

“We urge the Somali authorities to review the draft in order to ensure its conformity with international human rights standards,” the spokesperson for the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), Rupert Colville, told reporters in Geneva.

“We are particularly concerned that the draft legislation contains vague language and extremely broad categories that could easily be used to curtail freedom of expression, for instance requiring media not to contravene or disseminate information that is against Islam, or Somali traditions or traditional ethics,” he said.We urge the Somali authorities to review the draft in order to ensure its conformity with international human rights standards.

The draft law also requires journalists to reveal their sources if published information stirs up public sentiments, and would suspend journalists and other representatives of media organizations accused of violating the media legislation.

Colville said the Somali Government had promised to organize broad consultations prior to the law’s enactment. However, the draft media law was submitted and adopted by the Council of Ministers on 11 July and will now be submitted to the Somali legislature and later to the President. This process is estimated to take less than two months, leaving insufficient time for wide-ranging consultations to take place to improve the law.

OHCHR said it is also concerned about the composition of the proposed regulatory body, the National Media Council, and the selection process for its members, neither of which guarantee its independence.

Republished from HRW.org

Tanya Lokshina writes: “When I received an email late Thursday from one “Edward Snowden” I was naturally skeptical. The invitation, supposedly from one of the world’s most sought-after people, had a whiff of Cold War-era spy thriller to it. The note instructed me to go to the arrivals hall of Sheremetyevo Airport, where “someone from airport staff will be waiting there to receive you with a sign labeled ‘G9.’” What would you think?

Even as the media calls started flooding in, I was still thinking it might all be a hoax. While I juggled spooning mashed carrots into the mouth of my wailing child and talking to the BBC – journalists and babies are equally needy – I was still half thinking this wasn’t going to happen.

And then the phone rang.

It was airport security giving me further details and asking for my passport number. That was the moment it hit me: this was real, the world’s most wanted man wanted to meet me.

My phone was ringing nonstop and at some point I thought I’d miss the meeting altogether – the media calls were coming in so furiously it wasn’t allowing me time to get dressed and leave. But finally I managed to get my act together and made it to the airport express train just in time. While en route I received another phone call, but from a very different source: the United States embassy. Did I understand the position of the US? That Snowden was not a human rights defender but a law breaker who had to be held accountable? I said in response that the official position of Human Rights Watch on the case was in our statement published several weeks back. The US official said that the embassy was familiar with the statement but they also wanted me to convey the official US position to Snowden. I was surprised at the request but in the end decided to mention this to Snowden. It seemed only fair to let him know about this call.

The scene at the airport was like nothing I have ever experienced. I am used to crowds, and I am used to journalists, but what I saw before me was madness: a tangle of shouting people, microphone assaults and countless cameras, national and international media alike. I feared I might be torn apart in the frenzy.

I pushed through to the staff entrance in Terminal F, and there was the man with the sign, “G9.” Just like they said. So, along with eight other people – including the Russian ombudsman, an MP, and representatives of other rights groups – I was put on a bus and driven to another entrance. We walked in and there he was: Mr. Snowden waiting for us along with someone from Wikileaks and a translator.

The first thing I thought was how young he looks – like a school kid.

I managed to snap two pictures and send them to colleagues at Human Rights Watch to be posted on Twitter before we were told no photos.

The meeting lasted one hour. He read the statement and then said he was ready to answer questions. He said he wanted us to petition the US and European states not to interfere with his movements. Under the circumstances, he said, he had no other options but to file a claim for asylum in Russia. He said his living conditions were nothing to complain about and he was in good health – but that he couldn’t stay at the Moscow airport indefinitely. And it seemed that the only way to have his security guaranteed in Russia was to ask for asylum. Hence, the second request: please ask the Kremlin to support his asylum claim. Though he wants to move on to Latin America, he emphasized repeatedly, and said that Russia was a temporary move.

Then we left the same way we came in, along corridors and once again through the incredible media circus. It’s midnight in Moscow now – and I still haven’t had my breakfast.”

“Journalists must be able to carry out their work safely as they play an essential role in ensuring that a well-informed public can exercise its democratic rights,” stated Irina Bokova, Director-General of the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), who deplored the killings and voiced deep concern about the safety of media professionals in these countries.

On Tuesday, Akhmednabi Akhmednabiyev, deputy editor of the Novoye Delo weekly newspaper, was shot dead in his car near his home on the outskirts of Makhachkala, the capital of Dagestan province.

Akhmednabiyev, the second journalist to be killed in Russia this year, survived an assassination attempt in January and had received numerous threats to his life, UNESCO said in a news release.

“Using violence to silence journalists who inform society about the problems it is facing does not make those problems go away; it simply reduces a society’s ability to tackle them,” said Ms. Bokova. “I therefore trust that the authorities will spare no effort to bring to justice those responsible for a crime against a man and a profession that is important for democracy.”

The killing of Liban Abdullahi Farah on 7 July has once again highlighted concerns about the safety of journalists in Somalia, which continues to be one of the most dangerous places in the world to be a media professional.

“This killing marks another black day for journalists trying to carry out their professional duties in Somalia,” stated Ms. Bokova. “All too many media workers in the country have paid with their lives for our right to be kept informed. I pay tribute to their dedication and call on the authorities to spare no effort to stop these killings.”

Farah, a reporter for Bossasso-based Somali Broadcasting Corporation (SBC) and London-based Kalsan TV, was killed when three unidentified assailants opened fire on him in the Barahley neighborhood of Galkayo town.

Bokova also called on the Mexican authorities to investigate the death of Mario Ricardo Chávez Jorge, a journalist for El Ciudadano newspaper. His body was found in the state of Tamaulipas near the United States border on 26 June – two weeks after he was abducted as he was leaving a cinema with his family in Ciudad Victoria.

“It is important that the authorities investigate this killing and bring those responsible for it to trial,” said the Director-General.

CPJ’s census of journalists imprisoned on April 15 also highlights the severe deterioration of freedom of expression in Iran over time. In December 2004, during the last full year of President Mohammad Khatami’s tenure, CPJ documented just one journalist in prison during its annual worldwide prison census. By December 2009, after a contested presidential election returned Mahmoud Ahmedinejad to office, the number had grown to 23 in CPJ’s annual census. CPJ surveys since that time have consistently shown 35 to 50 journalists in prison in Iran at any given time.

Only Turkey, with 48 in jail, was detaining more journalists on April 15, CPJ research shows.

As devastating as the imprisonments are to the individual journalists and their families, the Iranian government’s tactics have had an intimidating effect on the press, choking off the flow of information. This census and CPJ’s past surveys are simply snapshots in time—they do not include the large numbers of journalists convicted of crimes or facing charges who are temporarily free on bail or furlough. Iran has pursued a revolving-door policy in imprisoning journalists, freeing some detainees on short-term furloughs even as they make new arrests. The pattern of rotating critical journalists in and out of prison has sown fear and self-censorship across the entire press corps, according to CPJ research. At least 68 Iranian journalists fled into exile between 2007 and 2012 due to harassment and the threat of imprisonment, according to CPJ research. Only Somali journalists have gone into exile in higher numbers during that period.

The Iranian government has used several other tactics to intimidate journalists. Authorities have blocked millions of websites, banned reformist publications, and conducted widespread electronic surveillance in an effort to make a wide range of topics off-limits to public debate. “Many of the topics we could cover five years ago, like cultural issues, we couldn’t do anymore,” Omid Memarian, an exiled Iranian journalist, told CPJ. “Journalists were even prevented from covering the earthquake relief efforts that happened in Iran last year.”

In 2013, as the Iranian government began a new wave of detentions aimed at silencing journalists ahead of the elections, Intelligence Minister Heydar Moslehi announced that 600 Iranian journalists were part of an anti-state network. He said the arrests were an attempt to “prevent the emergence of sedition prior to the elections.”

The stories submitted by Suha Audah, Enas Jabbar and Shatha al-Shabibi were selected by an independent panel for their depiction of women’s situation in Iraq.

Suha Audah’s article describes the pressure of traditional values on women practicing sports in Mosul, Enas Jabbar relates the suffering of women subjected to abduction and Shatha al-Shabibi addresses the sensitive issue of honour crimes, widespread in traditional Iraqi society.

“The selection was difficult since the quality of the articles received was high; most stories portrayed brilliantly the challenges faced by women in Iraq,” said the Secretary-General’s Deputy Special Representative for Political Affairs, Gyorgy Busztin, who was a member of the jury.

The three winners received their prizes during a special ceremony organized at the UN Compound on 1 May, as part of a roundtable discussion on women and media to mark World Press Freedom Day.

Ms. Audah, a freelance journalist from Mosul, highlighted the importance of such awards for Iraqi women journalists who are facing several difficulties in their daily work. “Women should be able to impose themselves,” she said. “However, when I claim women’s rights, some people label me as sexist.”

The winning stories were anonymously selected by an independent panel composed of Mr. Busztin, the head of the Public Information Office (PIO), Eliana Nabaa, the Senior Political Advisor to UN Assistance Mission in Iraq (UNAMI) and former journalist Hussain Hindawi and the representative for the UN Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women, Frances Guy.