'2012 bad year for journalists'

BAGUIO CITY, Philippines - The number of journalists imprisoned worldwide reached a record high this year, with Turkey, Iran and China topping the countries where most journalists were thrown in  jail, the New York-based press freedom watchdog Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) said.

A new report by CPJ said the trend of journalists being put behind bars is being “driven primarily by terrorism and other anti-state charges levied against critical reporters and editors.”

"We are living in an age when anti-state charges and 'terrorist' labels have become the preferred means that governments use to intimidate, detain, and imprison journalists," said CPJ Executive Director Joel Simon in the report.   "Criminalizing probing coverage of inconvenient topics violates not only international law, but impedes the right of people around the world to gather, disseminate, and receive independent information."

The "leading country jailers" were Turkey  with 49 imprisoned journalits, followed by Iran with 45 and China, 32, theC PJ said.

This pattern, according to Simon, is present in most of the countries included in the census.

In Turkey, the world's worst jailer, authorities held dozens of Kurdish reporters and editors on terror-related charges and other journalists for allegedly plotting against the government.

An extensive case-by-case review  in 2012, Simon said,  “confirmed journalism-related reasons in numerous cases previously unlisted by the organization, thus significantly raising the country's total.”

So far, aside from Vietnam (which has 14 journalists in prison),  no other Southeast Asian country was listed in the top 10 jailers in the CPJ review of countries.

Interestingly,  CPJ notes “for the first time since 1996, Burma is not among the nations jailing journalists.”   Following Burma’s  historic transition to civilian rule, it said, authorities there released at least 12 imprisoned journalists in a series of pardons over the past year.

“Record High In 2012”

Imprisoned journalists worldwide culled by the CPJ pegs 232 writers, editors, and photojournalists behind bars as of December 1, an increase of 53 from 2011 and the highest since the organization began the survey in 1990.

Simon said the 2012 figure surpasses the previous record of 185 journalists imprisoned in 1996, underlining a disturbing trend of conflating coverage of opposition groups or sensitive topics with terrorism, evident since 2001.

Rounding out the top five jailers were Eritrea, with 28 journalists in prison, and Syria with 15.   According to CPJ,  none of the journalists in jail in Erithea and Syria has been publicly charged with a crime or brought before a court or trial.

Over the past five years, the press freedom watchdog said, a little more than half (118) of those held globally were online journalists and more than a third were freelancers.

"We must fight back against governments seeking to cloak their repressive tactics under the banner of fighting terrorism; we must push for broad legislative changes in countries where critical journalism is being criminalized; we must stand up for all those journalists in prison and do all in our power to secure their release; and we must ensure the Internet itself remains an open global platform for critical expression," Simon said.

CPJ added that with their findings,  all of the governments included in census have received letters expressing serious concern. 

CPJ continues to advocate for the release of four recipients of its International Press Freedom Award who remain imprisoned: Dhondup Wangchen, a Tibetan held in China, Azimjon Askarov in Kyrgyzstan, Shi Tao in China, and Mohammad Davari in Iran.

This year, CPJ helped 58 imprisoned journalists from around the world win early release.

The annual census,  CPJ  said, is a snapshot of those incarcerated at midnight on December 1, 2012 excluding journalists imprisoned and released throughout the year, which are otherwise documented.

Journalists who either disappear or are abducted by non-state entities such as criminal gangs or militant groups are not included in the prison census as their cases are classified as "missing" or "abducted," the CPJ said.