Arrest & Detention

Bangladeshi authorities should immediately release reporter Ruhul Amin Gazi and let him work freely, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today. Yesterday evening, police officers in the Hatirjheel neighborhood of Dhaka, the capital,  arrested Gazi, a reporter with the Daily Sangram newspaper, according to news reports. The arrest came after Metropolitan Magistrate Debdash Chandra Adhikary rejected the journalist’s bail petition in an ongoing criminal investigation, according to those reports. Gazi and Daily Sangram editor Abul Asad have been under investigation for sedition since a complaint was filed in December 2019 over an article calling Abdul Quader Molla, an opposition…Read more

The Committee to Protect Journalists called on the government of the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh to immediately release journalist Siddique Kappan and drop any investigation into him. Kappan was arrested yesterday while traveling from the capital Delhi to Hathras district in Uttar Pradesh to report on a story, according to The Hindu and NDTV. According to K.N. Ashok, editor of Malayalam-language news website Azhimukham where Kappan is a regular contributor, Kappan was travelling to Hathras to cover the alleged gang rape and murder of a 19-year-old woman from a marginalized community that has sparked protests and national outrage. According…Read more

West Bengal authorities must immediately release journalists Suraj Ali Khan and Safikul Islam, as well as Islam’s wife, Alima Khatun, and drop all the charges against them and investigations into their work, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today. At about 3 a.m. on June 29, police arrested Khan and Islam at Islam’s home in Arambagh, in the Hoogly district of West Bengal, for alleged extortion, and also arrested Khatun, their lawyers, Pintu Karar and Samim Ahammed, told CPJ over the phone. Khan works as a reporter and Islam as an editor and…Read more

Mozambican authorities should not contest journalist Omardine Omar’s appeal and should allow him and all members of the press to work freely, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today. On June 30, the Ka Mpfumo court in Maputo, the capital, convicted Omar, a reporter for the privately owned news website Carta de Moçambique, on charges of civil disobedience, the journalist told CPJ via messaging app. A fixer and another individual who were with Omar at the time were also convicted, he told CPJ. Judge Francisca Antonio ignored the prosecutor’s request that charges be…Read more

Authorities in Botswana should drop all charges against journalists David Baaitse and Kenneth Mosekiemang, and allow them to work freely, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today. At about 2:30 p.m. on June 18, intelligence agents arrested Baaitse, a reporter for the privately owned Weekend Post weekly, and Mosekiemang, a photographer for the outlet, after they photographed a building linked to the Directorate of Intelligence and Security, the country’s domestic and international intelligence agency, according to Baaitse and his editor, Aubrey Lute, who spoke to CPJ via phone and messaging app. Over a period of…Read more