1 May 2001
THREE JOURNALISTS PERSECUTED FOR THEIR WORK
The Writers in Prison Committee (WiPC) of International PEN is commemorating World Press Freedom Day by highlighting the cases of three journalists persecuted for practising their profession: Nizar Nayouf of Syria, Grigory Pasko of Russia, and Jean-Luc Kinyongo Saleh of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). "Their plight serves to illustrate the problems of hundreds more," says WiPC. In the past year, International PEN has monitored over 700 cases of writers and journalists under attack in 99 countries. "These figures show that the optimism of the early nineties that the democratisation of many former repressive regimes would bring an easing of human rights abuses was misplaced," says WiPC.
Nayouf, last year's UNESCO/Guillermo Cano Prize winner, is in his ninth year of imprisonment for membership in a banned political group and for editing its monthly newsletter. WiPC considers Nayouf to be detained solely for the peaceful exercise of his right to freedom of expression and association, and is calling for his immediate and unconditional release on humanitarian grounds. The International Press Institute (IPI) and the World Association of Newspapers (WAN) report that Nayouf began a new hunger strike on 24 April after the authorities withdrew a promise to release him. In February, he went 16 days without food to protest a ban on visits by his family. IPI fears that Nayouf, who is near death, will not survive another hunger strike [See IFEX "Communique" #10-10, #10-5, #9-23 and #9-12.]">http://communique.ifex.org/articles.cfm?category=0X&volume=10&issue_no=10&lng=english#2875">IFEX "Communique" #10-10, #10-5, #9-23 and #9-12.]
Pasko, a Russian military and environmental journalist whose exposé of the dumping of nuclear waste into the Japan Sea led him to being charged with espionage, was acquitted in July 1999. However, nearly two years later, he will face a judge for the same offence in July 2001 and could face eight years or more in prison. WiPC considers the re-opening of the trial against Pasko to be an attempt to deter those who report critically on environmental issues in Russia [See IFEX "Communique" # 9-38 and #8-27]. ">http://communique.ifex.org/articles.cfm?category=1%20Regional%20News&volume=9&issue_no=38&lng=english#2325">IFEX "Communique" # 9-38 and #8-27].
Kinyongo is one of many Congolese journalists suffering harassment and imprisonment despite hopes of change for the better following the death of President Laurent-Desiré Kabila, notes WiPC. Kinyongo was arrested on 16 February 2001 as a result of an article accusing the former interior minister of profiting from the civil war. "Not for the first time, it appears that the DRC's courts had been used in an attempt to silence those whose writing the government finds inconvenient," says WiPC. For more information, and for addresses to write appeals on behalf of these journalists, see www.ifex.org/alerts/view.html?id=8628.
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