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Sudan’s military coup and the stifling of speech

 

Net jamming and journalist arrests, the military junta is squeezing speech in Sudan. Plus, the political rise of far-right French journalist Eric Zemmour.

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Hard news for Turkey's journalists

Turkey is surprisingly one of the most repressive places for journalists to operate thanks to a government which views reporters as the enemy.  That is not close to hyperbole either.

Journalists in Turkish jails declined to 40 from 49 the previous year, as some were freed pending trial. Others benefited from new legislation that allowed defendants in lengthy pre-trial detentions to be released for time served. Additional journalists were freed after CPJ had completed its census on December 1. Still, authorities are holding dozens of Kurdish journalists on terror-related charges and others for allegedly participating in anti-government plots. Broadly worded anti-terror and penal code statutes allow Turkish authorities to conflate the coverage of banned groups with membership, according to CPJ research.

List of arrested journalists

Name	Media	Position	Date arrested	Status	Background info	Pictures
Abdulcebbar Karabeğ	Azadiya Welat	correspondent in Mersin	2010-09-26	Released on 2012-11-02[4]	detained at the closed prison of Hatay
Abdullah Çetin	Dicle Haber Ajansı	correspondent in Kurtalan	2011-12-16	Arrested	detained at the D-Type prison in Diyarbakır
Ahmet Akyol	Dicle Haber Ajansı	correspondent in Adana	2011-05-09	Arrested	detained at the M-Type prison in Ceyhan, Adana
Ahmet Birsin	Gün TV	general coordinator	2009-04-14	Arrested	detained at the D-Type prison in Diyarbakır
Ali Konar	Azadiya Welat	correspondent in Elazig	2010-05-27	Arrested	detained at the E-Type prison in Malatya
Ayşe Oyman	Özgür Gündem	editor	2011-12-24	Arrested	detained at the L-Type women prison in Bakırköy,Istanbul
Aziz Tekin	Azadiya Welat	correspondent in Mardin	2012-01-29	Arrested	detained at the E-Type prison in Mardin
Bayram Namaz	Atılım	writer	2006-09-10	Arrested	detained at the F-Type prison in Edirne
Bedri Adanır	Aram Yayınları, Hawar	general director	2010-01-08	Released on 2012-11-27[6]	detained during 689 days at the D-Type prison inDiyarbakır
Cengiz Kapmaz	Özgür Gündem	writer	2011-11-26	Arrested	detained at the F-Type prison in Kandira
Çağdaş Kaplan	Dicle Haber Ajansı	correspondent in Istanbul	2011-12-20	Arrested	detained at the F-Type prison in Kandira
Davut Uçar	Etik Ajans	director	2011-12-24	Arrested	detained at the F-Type prison in Kandira
Deniz Yıldırım			2009-11-09	Arrested
Derek Stoffel	CBC News	journalist	2013-06-12	Released on 2013-06-12[7]

"The police were just behind us. The first tear gas they threw hit me. I clutched my head. Blood was pouring out."

Ahmet Sik is a widely respected, well-known investigative journalist in Turkey. He recalls the day he got injured while covering the protests in Istanbul's Gezi Park this summer. He is convinced that he was targeted by the police.

"There were at most 10 metres between us," he says.

"A gas bomb that's thrown by hand hits me directly on the head. The people who were hospitalised just after me were: a pro-Kurdish opposition MP, a main opposition MP and the journalist who took the iconic picture of a woman in red dress being tear-gassed. This can't all be coincidence."

Rape threats

I had been sent by the BBC from London to cover the protests in Istanbul and I tweeted a comment from one protester calling for an economic boycott for six months to get the government to listen.

Later, the quote was ascribed to me by the mayor of the Turkish capital, Ankara, as if I had had been the one calling for a boycott.

He started a Twitter campaign against me, calling me a British agent and a traitor and called on his more than 700,000 followers to show their "democratic reaction". Thousands of death and rape threats followed.

Two days later, Mr Erdogan accused me in a speech of "being involved in a conspiracy against my own country".

The threats and the hate campaign against me have fizzled out but, months later, some journalists in Turkey are still being intimidated by officials.

Turkey's government wants the world to believe that it is functioning elective representative government which seeks membership in the EU and respects human rights but the reality is far removed from the governments narrative.