About IFEX:

News by region:

IFEX Campaigns and Advocacy:

IFEX Email Products:

Opportunities and assistance:

Alert

Two detained "La Référence Plus" journalists released

(JED/IFEX) - Publisher André Ipakala Abeiye Mobiko and reporter Valère Bisweko, from the Kinshasa-based daily "La Référence Plus", who were detained on Friday 1 June 2001 at around 2 p.m. (local time) at the newspaper's head office in Kinshasa/Kasa-Vubu by agents from the Kinshasa Provincial Inspectorate (Inspection provinciale de Kinshasa, IPK) of the Congolese National Police (Police nationale congolaise, PNC), were released on the same day at around 10 p.m. They were required to present themselves to the police again on Saturday 2 June, in order to "close the affair."




During their detention, the PNC's press service filmed the newspaper's publisher, who responded to questions asked by a police officer about the killer-cutthroat incident that all Kinshasa was talking about and that the newspapers had reported on. On 1 June at 8 p.m., the images were circulated to the news bureau of the national public radio-television station, RTNC.

In its Thursday 31 May edition (issue 2176), "La Référence Plus" had published an article entitled: "Killer-cutthroats terrorise Kinshasa". The article was illustrated by photographs showing the mutilated corpses of two adolescents. The newspaper neglected to include a caption stating that the photos published were taken from "La Référence Plus"'s archives. The omission angered the PNC's Special Services Unit, who beleive that "these images unecessarily alerted the public opinion." According to the PNC's services, "the case of the killer-cutthroats is nothing but a legend, because there are no witnesses whatsoever who testify to having seen murdered mutilated bodies."