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Alert

Police close Al-Jazeera network's Khartoum bureau

(RSF/IFEX) - RSF has condemned the Sudanese police's closure of the Qatar-based satellite television news network Al-Jazeera's Khartoum bureau. Police closed the local bureau and also detained bureau chief Islam Salih for three hours on the evening of 18 December 2003.

"We call on the security services to authorise the immediate reopening of Al-Jazeera's Khartoum bureau and to stop censoring the TV network by preventing it from carrying news about Sudan," RSF Secretary-General Robert Ménard said.

The authorities accused the Arabic-language network of broadcasting false information in a report about tuberculosis victims in Sudanese mines, an interview with members of the political opposition and a report from the province of Darfour.

A day earlier, on 17 December, the bureau was raided by police, who did not have a warrant. They confiscated transmission equipment and three cameras on the pretext that no customs duties were paid when the equipment was brought into the country.

The confiscation of the equipment was clearly motivated by the authorities' displeasure over Al-Jazeera's coverage of Sudan. Several days earlier, the authorities had threatened to raid the bureau if it did not immediately change the tone of its coverage, especially with regards to the civil war in southern Sudan.