Author Magdi El Shafai and his publisher Mohamed El Sahrqawi were fined 5,000 Egyptian pounds for the publication of graphic novel Metro. The court ruling, on 21 November, deemed the two men guilty of “making and publishing something that was...
The Far Eastern Economic Review (FEER), which is due to close next month, was ordered to pay Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong and Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew a total of S$405,000 (US$290,000) in damages and costs for defamation. The journal’s...
Twenty-one politicians and journalists who were abducted in the southern Philippines have been found dead. A convoy of about 40 people was hijacked by 100 gunmen at a police checkpoint in Maguindanao province, on the island of Mindanao. The group...
Brazilian judge, Pedro Sakamoto has prohibited bloggers Enock Cavalcanti and Adriana Vandoni from reporting on injunctions issued against politician José Riva. Vandoni and Cavalcanti, both from the Brazilian state of Mato Grosso, reported on an...
A government directive published on 13 November lifted all remaining restrictions on the media’s use of minority languages. The use of Kurdish had been allowed in public printed media and one public TV station, TRT6. However, privately-owned radio...
On 12 November, Cuban authorities refused to issue visas for 15 international journalists hoping to report on the Global Forum for Health Research in Havana from 16-20 November. International journalism organisation Media 21, based in Switzerland,...
On 16 November, US President Barack Obama’s first serious engagement with the Chinese people ran afoul of China’s restrictions on broadcasting. He addressed the youth of Shanghai in a so-called "town hall" meeting, but it was not shown on national...
Bariş Sözal, a journalist at Sabah newspaper, and his driver Ali Kocatepe were detained for 8 hours after taking photographs at Istanbul’s Sabiha Gökçen Airport. Sözal had been gathering information for a story which revealed that airport security...
Moroccan newspaper Al-Michaal was banned on 13 November after editor in chief Driss Chahtan was sentenced to one year in prison and a 10,000 dirham fine as punishment for his articles about the health of King Mohamed VI. Two other journalists on...
Matthew Parris, one of Britain’s most renowned newspaper columnists, has been appointed a trustee of Index on Censorship, the UK’s leading organisation promoting freedom of expression. And, in an exciting week for free speech in the UK, musical...