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Kurdish journalists face up to fresh
challenges in Iraqi Kurdistan
5.2.2008
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Reporters Without Borders
February 5, 2008
Sulaimaniyah, Kurdistan Region 'Iraq',-- Five
journalists were stopped and questioned by Kurdish
security forces after braving a ban on travel to
Iraq’s Kurdistan border with Turkey, while the trial
opened Monday of the editor of the independent
weekly Hawlati, Abid Aref, accused of defaming
President Jalal Tabani, for which he faces up to one
year in prison. Abid Aref was
released on
1-million-dinar bail.
“We urge the authorities to take a stronger line in
favour of press freedom,” the worldwide press
freedom organisation said. “Speeches are not enough.
Journalists who cover the news must have their
rights protected.”
“The passing of a new information law, still being
examined by the regional parliament, will be a
crucial first step for the future of the media in
Kurdistan”, it added.
Security forces arrested five journalists on 1st
February near the Sengeser control post,www.ekurd.net
in Sulaimaniyah
province, as they returned from the Qandil mountains
on the Iraqi Kurdistan-Turkish border. Rahman Gharib
(photo) was mistreated after he tried to resist the
police.
“We went there the evening before to meet people who
are suffering from Turkish bombing. We saw that much
of the infrastructure - including schools and
hospitals - has been destroyed. We interviewed the
residents of isolated villages and took photos of
the damage”, the journalist told Reporters Without
Borders.
They were arrested as they tried to rejoin several
colleagues who were waiting for them. Rahman Gharib,
Bayez Mohammed, of Hawlati, Salam Abdallah, of the
website Kurdistan Post,www.ekurd.net
and freelance
journalists Kerwan Salar and Mohammed Çawsin were
questioned briefly. Surwan Omar, of the news agency
Kurdistan News, was beaten by police when he tried
to approach the group.
Elsewhere, a defamation case brought by President
Jalal Talabani against the editor of Hawlati opened
today at a court in Sulaimaniyah, 330 km north of
Baghdad. Abid Aref faces up to one year in prison
for carrying a report on 13 January by US researcher
Michael Rubin of the American Enterprise Institute
for Public Policy Research, which was highly
critical of several Kurdish figures, including the
Iraqi head of state. The journalist was released
after paying bail of one million Dinars (about 558
Euros) and the trial was postponed to a later date,
not yet announced.
rsf org
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