15 March 2007

Alert

Two American journalists briefly detained by police; Rwandan journalist also detained before escaping


Incident details

Kevin Whitelaw, Kevin Horan, Jean-Léonard Rugambage

journalist(s)

detained

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(JED/IFEX) - Reporter Kevin Whitelaw and photographer Kevin Horan of "US News and World Report", an American weekly published in Washington D.C., and Jean-Léonard Rugambage, a journalist with the weekly newspaper "Umuco" published in the Rwandan capital, Kigali, were detained by police on 6 March 2007 while covering a hearing of a gacaca (popular court) at Nyamiyaga, 25 km south of Kigali.

Information collected by Journalist in Danger (JED) from the journalists indicates that the police blamed them for not having accreditation to cover the hearing, and yet the journalists actually had official accreditation.

Whitelaw and Horan were taken to a police station where they were instructed to hand in their equipment, whereas Rugambage managed to escape.

The American reporters were released three hours after they had been arrested, following intervention by the American Embassy in Kigali, but not before they had handed in the memory card containing photographs of the trial.



Source

Journaliste en danger
B.P. 633 - Kinshasa 1
374, av. Col. Mondjiba
Complexe Utexafrica, Galerie St Pierre, 1er niveau, Local 18 Kinshasa/Ngaliema
République Démocratique du Congo
direction (@) jed-afcentre.org
Phone: +243 81 99 29 323
Fax: +44 20 7900 3413
 

Rwanda

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