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Mam Sonando, the 71-year-old director of Cambodia’s only independent radio station, Beehive Radio, was sentenced to 20 years of prison in a Cambodian court Monday. He was found guilty in inciting a rebellion in the eastern state of Kratie, where he allegedly urged thousands of villagers to take up arms against the Cambodian government.
Sonando, who is also a prominent rights activist and the President of Cambodia’s Democrat Association, was arrested in July at the request of the Cambodian Prime Minister, Hun Sen.
An Iranian court on Sunday convicted the Tehran bureau chief of the Thomson Reuters news agency of “propaganda-related offences” for a video that briefly described a group of women involved in martial arts training as killers. Parisa Hafezi was found guilty of “spreading lies” against the Islamic system for the February video, which initially carried a headline saying that the women were training as ninja “assassins.” A sentence by the court is expected within a week.
The future of the British press lies in the hands of Lord Justice Leveson. Marta Cooper reports
From mid-June to early August this year, Sudan has witnessed nationwide protests directly calling for regime change, sparked by an alarming increase in prices. The protests were met with a massive crackdown on civil liberties, and a wave of arrests by National Intelligence and Security Services (NISS), Sudan’s security apparatus. While journalists were not disproportionately impacted by the crackdown, what they have experienced during the past few weeks helps paint a picture of a country on the brink of economic collapse and escalating political turmoil.