WUNRN
World Press Freedom Day - UN -
Full Article
Journalists
Need Better Protection
_______________________________________________________________________
Reporters Without Borders
http://www.rsf.org:80/article.php3?id_article=30954
WORLD PRESS FREEDOM DAY
For World Press Freedom Day, Reporters Without Borders is
campaigning for the release of three women journalists who have been “taken
hostage” by governments.
Four members of Reporters Without Borders have been on hunger strike since 28 April in support of Iranian-American journalist Roxana Saberi, who has been sentenced to eight years in prison in Iran on a charge of spying for the United States.
Saberi
has herself been on hunger strike since 21 April in protest against her
conviction on a trumped-up charge. Her life is in danger. Reporters Without
Borders is taking over her hunger strike so that she does not have to continue
it herself. Beginning on 3 May, similar protests are going to be staged in
Canada, the United States (in front of the UN headquarters), Britain, Belgium
and Spain.
There
is also an urgent need to obtain the release of two American journalists
employed by California-based Current TV, Euna Lee and Laura Ling, who have been
held in Pyongyang since 17 March.
During
a special evening event dedicated to the subject of North Korea which Reporters
Without Borders organised in Paris on 27 April, the French secretary of state
for foreign affairs and human rights, Rama Yade, offered her support for human
rights organisations campaigning for their release.
The
detention of Saberi, Lee and Ling on arbitrary charges demonstrates more than
ever the importance of World Press Freedom Day, which we will be celebrating on
3 May. We appeal to the Iranian and North Korean authorities to free these
three women without delay.
Saberi,
Lee and Ling are professional journalists who are neither spies nor criminals.
Through them, press freedom and the right to report the news freely are being
taken hostage by Iran and North Korea.
_________________________________________________________________________
http://www.rsf.org/rubrique.php3?id_rubrique=20
http://www.rsf.org/rubrique.php3?id_rubrique=795
WORLD PRESS FREEDOM REPORT 2009
================================================================
To contact the list administrator, or to leave the list, send an email to: wunrn_listserve-request@lists.wunrn.com.
Thank you.