At a ceremony presided over by Salman Rushdie, president of PEN, the largest center of the international literacy organization dedicated to defending freedom of expression in the world, the Gambian slain editor, Deyda Hydara was awarded at American Museum of Natural History in New York.

Hydara who was killed last year by unknown assailants was awarded one of the2005 PEN/Barbara Goldsmith Freedom to Write Awards. 37 writers and journalists have received the award since it was established in 1987, but Mr. Hydara is the first to receive the honor posthumously. Historian and award sponsor Ms. Goldsmith underscored the importance of this unprecedented honor in NBC news video announcing the award, saying that it reflected PEN's growing alarm over the unpunished murders of journalists around the world and concern for the deterioration of press freedom in The Gambia, as well as the organization's great respect for Mr. Hydara, a leading champion of freedom of expression in that country.[AllAfrica.com]

Sri Lankan journalists have condemned the killing of Dharmarathnam Sivaram, editor of Tamilnet website. All the associations of journalists, Free Media Movement, the Editors Guild and Sri Lanka Journalists Forums have deplored the killing describing it as a cowardly and despicable act and an attempt to suppress freedom of expression.[Asian Tribune]

Just 17 percent of the world's population lives in countries that enjoy a free press.

If you live in Central Asia, Russia, Afghanistan, or Iran you are not among them. You belong to the 45 percent of the globe's inhabitants that live in countries with media that is rated as "not free."

That's according to a new survey titled "Freedom of Press: A Global Survey of Media Independence" by Freedom House, a U.S. nongovernmental organization.

The survey says setbacks in press freedom were recorded in Pakistan, the United States, and several other countries. At the same time, improvements took place in countries where democratic changes appeared, such as Ukraine and Lebanon.

Freedom House has rated five countries including North Korea and Turkmenistan as "the worst of the worst." The organization says that in these countries, independent media are either non-existent or barely able to operate. In Turkmenistan, all media outlets are controlled by the state. [Radio Free Europe]

More than two years after taking office amid uncertainty about his political views, Chinese President Hu Jintao is emerging as an unyielding leader determined to preserve the Communist Party's monopoly on power and willing to impose new limits on speech and other civil liberties to do it, according to party officials, journalists and analysts.

Some say Hu has cast himself as a hard-liner to consolidate his position after a delicate leadership transition and could still lead the party in a more open direction. There is a growing consensus inside and outside the government, however, that the 62-year-old former engineer believes the party should strengthen its rule by improving its traditional mechanisms of governance, not by introducing democratic reforms.

Hu has placed particular emphasis on tightening the party's control over public opinion, presiding over a crackdown to restore discipline to state media and intimidate dissident intellectuals. He has also gone further than his predecessor, Jiang Zemin, by adopting new measures to regulate discussions on university Internet sites and the activities of nongovernmental organizations.[Washington Post]

China has freed a journalist who served more than 14 years of a 15-year sentence for inciting rebellion around the time of the 1989 democracy movement, French-based rights watchdog Reporters Without Borders said on Friday.[Swissinfo]

The Media Institute of Southern Africa (MISA) presents an annual Press Freedom Award with a cash prize of US$1 000 to honour excellence in journalism.

Excellence in journalism may be described as the upholding of the ethics of the profession at all costs, and the relentless pursuit of the truth. The award is also in recognition of the work of an individual or institution contributing significantly to the promotion of media freedom in the region. The excellence which the award acknowledges can be achieved either through reportage or in other ways such as media reform, lobbying or training.

 
ELIGIBILITY: The MISA Press Freedom Award is open to all forms of media e.g. photography, print, producers, radio, video, film, Internet, or media associations and institutions. Eligible individuals or institutions should be based in the southern African region (SADC region).

NOMINATIONS: NOMINATIONS FOR THE 2005 AWARD ARE NOW OPEN.

All nominations should be accompanied by a motivation not exceeding 1 500 words and the CV of the nominee. Where applicable, a copy of the work, or a portfolio of work, should be included with the nomination. Nominations should be sent to the MISA Secretariat, for the attention of the Regional Director, to:

Postal:

Private Bag 13386
Windhoek
Namibia
[AllAfrica.com]

Freedom House, which monitors the sate of freedom around the world every year, has placed Pakistan among countries where the press is “Not Free.”

According to Freedom House which released the survey this week, “Pakistan dropped from Partly Free to Not Free because of increased official harassment of journalists and media outlets, in addition to passage of a bill that increased penalties for defamation. The moves followed other aggressive measures taken over the last two years by military authorities to silence critical or investigative voices in the media. A number of journalists have been pressured to resign from prominent publications, charged with sedition, or arrested and intimidated by intelligence officials while in custody.” Only two countries - Pakistan and Kenya - registered a negative category shift in 2004, moving from Partly Free to Not Free. Pakistan was also among countries where Freedom House said “notable setbacks” had taken place. Others so listed were Kenya, Mexico, Venezuela, and in the United States itself.[Daily Times]

Egyptian police and security forces Wednesday used batons to disperse hundreds of pro-reform demonstrators across the country, arresting at least 75 activists, organizers said.

It was the single largest number of arrests since opposition elements escalated their campaign against a fifth mandate for veteran President Hosni Mubarak a few weeks ago in a daring challenge to his 24-year rule.[Middle East Online]

Renowned Tamil journalist, Mr. Dharmeratnam Sivaram, who was kidnapped late Thursday night at 10:30 pm was found dead earlier today morning at Himbulala, a Sinhala suburb, according to media sources.   Assailants who kidnapped him from the front of the Bamabalapitiya Police station are believed to be have killed him, according to media sources. 

Mr. Sivaram was kidnapped as he left a restaurant situated right opposite the Bamabalapitiya Police station according to the Sri Lankan Free Media Movement.[TamilEelamNews.com]

Reporters Without Borders protested as the repeated harassment of Irina Petrushova, editor of Kazakh opposition weekly Respublika and  a Russian national, because of her political stand towards the Kazakh government. She was arrested and held for two days by police in Volokolamsk, 120 kilometres west of Moscow.[CASCFEN]

On 26 April 2005, journalist Gilberto Martínez Prado, director of the Colmundo Radio news programme, received a death threat in the southern city of Ibagué (Tolima). Upon arriving at the radio station at 12:30 p.m. (local time) he found a "sufragio" - a note written in the format of the traditional sympathy cards to relatives of deceased people. The threat read ". . . continue criticising, you're doing very well, you big son of a bitch, hide behind your microphone that makes you a big shot, but, just wait, 'malparido' [literally, a defective or aborted fetus], everyone winds up in the cemetery." [IFEX]

Mexico's journalists are under siege from organized criminals who are targeting them for assassination and kidnappings, threatening their families and employers, and trying to silence them.

In the last 101/2 years, 29 Mexican journalists have been killed, according to the Inter American Press Association. Last year, in eight attacks on journalists, four were killed. So far this year, one journalist has been killed in three incidents.[Sun-Sentinel.com]

A college production tells the story of Matthew Sheppard, a student beaten to death because he was gay.

And soon, it could be banned in Alabama.

Republican Alabama lawmaker Gerald Allen says homosexuality is an unacceptable lifestyle. As CBS News Correspondent Mark Strassmann reports, under his bill, public school libraries could no longer buy new copies of plays or books by gay authors, or about gay characters. [CBS News]

Hartford Courant staff photographer Brad Clift was detained by security forces and placed under house arrest in the troubled Darfur region of Sudan on Tuesday.

Clift was working with an aid group near the southern Darfur town of Nyala at the time of his arrest. No official reason has been given for his detention.[Photo District News]

New York, April 27, 2005—A court in the Belarusian capital, Minsk, handed brief jail sentences today to two Russian journalists arrested while covering an opposition rally, according to local and international press reports. The Committee to Protect Journalists said it was alarmed by the action and called for the release of the two reporters.

The Leninsky Court sentenced Aleksey Ametyov, a correspondent for the Russian edition of Newsweek magazine, to a 10-day term and Mikhail Romanov, a reporter for the Russian daily Moskovsky Komsomolets, to an eight-day term. The two were accused of participating in a rally not sanctioned by the Minsk government, according to press reports.[Committee to Protect Journalists]

Bahrain's ministry of information has issued an order requiring local webmasters to register their sites with their officials, triggering a nationwide on whether the plan posed a threat to freedom of expression or not.[Index on Censorship]