Some of the illustrious defenders of freedom of the press gathered in Paris this week to march for freedom: King Abdullah of Jordan, which last year sentenced a Palestinian journalist to 15 years hard labour; Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu of Turkey, which imprisons more journalists than any other country in the world; Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel, whose forces killed 17 journalists in Gaza last year (second highest in the world in 2014, after Syria); Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry of Egypt, which has detained photographer Shawkan for over 500 days, as well as al-Jazeera journalists; Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov of Russia, which last year jailed a journalist for insulting a government servant; Minister of Foreign Affairs Ramtane Lamamra of Algeria, which has detained journalist Abdessami Abdelhaï for 15 months without charge; Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan, Foreign Minister of the United Arab Emirates, which in 2013 held a journalist incommunicado for a month on suspicion of links with the Muslim Brotherhood; Prime Minister Mehdi Jomaa of Tunisia, which recently jailed blogger Yassine Ayari for 3 years for defaming the army; Prime Ministers Irakli Garibashvili of Georgia and Boyko Borisov of Bulgaria, both of whom have a record of attacking and beating journalists; Attorney General Eric Holder of the United States, where police in Ferguson, Missouri recently detained and assaulted Washington Post reporters (in fact the US record of literal war on journalists deserves a separate discussion, see Jeremy Scahills report at democracynow.org/2015/1/12/circus_of_hypocrisy_jeremy_scahill_on); Prime Minister Antonis Samaras of Greece, where riot police beat and injured two journalists at a protest in June last year; Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg of NATO, which has yet to be held to account for deliberately bombing and killing 16 Serbian journalists in 1999; President Ibrahim Boubacar Keïta of Mali, where journalists are expelled for covering human rights abuses; Foreign Minister Sheikh Khalid bin Ahmed Al Khalifa of Bahrain, second biggest jailer of journalists in the world, per capita (and where journalists are also tortured); Sheikh Mohamed Ben Hamad Ben Khalifa Al Thani of Qatar, which sentenced a man in 2012 to 15 years in prison for writing a poem; Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, who had several journalists jailed for insulting him in 2013; Prime Minister Miro Cerar of Slovenia, which sentenced a blogger to six months in prison for defamation in 2013; Taoiseach (Prime Minister) Enda Kenny of Ireland, where blasphemy is a criminal offense; Prime Minister Ewa Kopacz of Poland, where police raided a magazine to seize recordings embarrassing to the countrys ruling party last year; Prime Minster David Cameron of the United Kingdom, where authorities destroyed documents obtained by The Guardian newspaper and threatened journalists with prosecution in 2013; and Dr. Mohammed bin Ismail Al-Sheikh, ambassador to France of Saudi Arabia, which publicly flogged blogger Raif Badawi for insulting Islam last week (for what its worth, while not making the trip to Paris Syrian President Bashar al-Assad also publicly defended free speech this week, not wanting to be left out I suppose). Quite a rogues gallery. With friends like these, freedom of speech doesnt need enemies. Thanks to LSE student Daniel Wickham, whose series of tweets first brought this list to light earlier this week.
Posted on: Thu, 15 Jan 2015 08:28:41 +0000
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