Freedom of expression

Dear friends,  Three police officers accused of the murder of journalist Ridwan Salamun have been acquitted. Ridwan Salamun was covering the communal clashes in Tual, Southeast Maluku in August last year as a camera man for SUN TV. The police officers witnessed the assault against Mr. Salamun but did nothing to prevent it, effectively consenting to […]

The Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) congratulates Indians on their 65th Independence Day. The world’s largest democracy, has come a long way from what it was in 1947 – an impoverished and underdeveloped nation – to become the third largest economy in the world in terms of purchase power parity. While in the immediate neighbourhood […]

Dear friends,  The Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) has received information that a journalist Mr. Nilupa Sanjaya Liyanagehewa of Neth FM, one of the Sri Lanka’s leading electronic media institutions, was assaulted by a group of 15 police officers attached to the Mulleriyawa Police Station on 4 June 2011. He was later admitted to the […]

Dear friends,  The Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) has received information that the chief news editor of the Jaffna-based Tamil newspaper ‘Uthayan’, Mr. Gnanasundaram Kuganathan (59) was assaulted by a group of unidentified persons on 29 July 2011. Following the assault Mr. Kuganathan was admitted to the Jaffna Teaching Hospital in critical condition. Later several […]

A Press Release from Journalists for Democracy in Sri Lanka forwarded by the Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) A top editor of the Jaffna-based ‘Uthayan’ newspaper has been brutally attacked and seriously wounded by unknown armed men on Friday (29) in the heart of the heavily-guarded northern Jaffna town. According to media sources in Jaffna, […]

Dear friends,  The Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) has learned that six leaders of the Parti Socialis Malaysia (PSM) remain in detention without trial under sections 3(1) and 4(1) of the Emergency (Public Order and Prevention of Crime) Ordinance 1969 (EO), which allows the police to detain suspects without trial for up to 60 days. […]

In response to the HKSAR’s attempted arrest and subsequent obstruction of a human rights observer of the Hong Kong Human Rights Monitor (HKHRM) in his execution of observation duties and journalists were interrupted and arrested when exercising their duties on the 14th anniversary of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People’s Republic of […]

The Asian Human Rights Commission is seriously concerned about the recent arrests and intimidation by the Malaysian government against the leaders and supporters of the Coalition for Clean and Fair Elections (Bersih 2.0) in Malaysia. Bersih 2.0, a coalition of over 60 NGOs, planned to hold a rally on July 9 to demand electoral reforms […]

Dear friends,  Surabaya District Police officers attacked several journalists during a public parade when they refused to stop video recording the arrest and beating of a fellow journalist. The journalists later reported the case to the Surabaya resort police. The East Java Regional Police who had later taken over the case gave a false announcement […]

Dear friends,  A journalist has been implicated in a fabricated case of murder by persons from the ruling party. The journalist was assisting a rape victim (a 14-year-old girl) and her family in the enquiry and providing legal assistance. He was the person who reported the case and lodged the First Information Report (FIR) against […]

The correspondents of international media houses have been warned not to attend meetings or gatherings at the premises of the different press clubs in the major cities of the country. A circular from a well known international news agency that wishes to remain anonymous for security reasons, was issued to its correspondents asking them to […]

Reporters Without Borders / Reporters sans frontières 06-08-2011 (Audio interview available on the website (Sinhala / English) Eng : http://en.rsf.org/sri-lanka-interview-with-wife-of-cartoonist-08-06-2011,40424.html Fr : http://fr.rsf.org/sri-lanka-interview-de-l-epouse-du-08-06-2011,40422.html Five hundred days have gone by since Prageeth Ekneligoda, a journalist and cartoonist who worked for the Lankaenews website, went missing in Colombo on 24 January 2010. In all this time, no progress has […]

The Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (PEMRA), which is an official organisation to monitor electronic media, has issued notices to four television channels, Geo News, Dawn News, News One and Dunya News, for being irresponsible and provoking anti-national sentiments among viewers by ‘over sensitizing’ events unnecessarily. These notices were issued after the incident of the […]

In May 2011, the government of Thailand announced that the country would go to a national election on July 3. It might have been expected that this announcement would result in a lessening of the threats against, and arrests of, persons trying to exercise free speech. In fact, the opposite is the case. Since the […]

PAKISTAN: The Baloch Noam Chomsky is dead Malik Siraj Akbar There is renewed anger across Balochistan over the dreadful assassination of one of the most popular icons of Balochi literature and civil society, Dr. Saba Dashtiyari. A professor of Islamic studies at the University of Balochistan, the fifty-eight-year old university educator was gunned down when […]

By Shamsul Islam A ban has been imposed on all government officials from interacting with the media under the new Protection and communication of official information rule. As per Rule 46 of the Punjab Government Rules of Business 2011, which was recently circulated among all provincial departments all government employees are hereby forbidden to speak […]

Mr. Hameed Haroon, the chief executive officer of the Dawn, a leading daily newspaper of Pakistan and the president of the All Pakistan Newspaper Society, an organization of owners of the print media, has confirmed that the slain journalist, Mr. Saleem Shahzad, had received threatening messages from Pakistan’s notorious intelligence agency, the ISI on at […]

Saleem Shahzad, who had earlier announced the danger to his life from the intelligence services (ISI) in Pakistan was abducted last Sunday, May 29, and his body was discovered on May 31. This is one more of the mysterious abductions and extrajudicial killings that have been taking place in Pakistan on a regular basis. He […]

Dear friends,  The Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) has received information that a senior journalist of Asia Times, a Hong Kong-based news agency, was abducted by unidenfied persons from Islamabad, the capital city of Pakistan. Mr. Saleem Shahzad was going to a private television channel to give an interview on his revelation about the militants […]

Dear friends,  After the Manokwari District Police in West Papua arrested peaceful protesters following a flag raising event on 14 December, 2010, seven persons were charged with rebellion. The detainees were ill-treated and denied medical care for weeks resulting in serious health conditions. Police forced the victims to sign the dossier of the case before […]