Sri Lanka – Government-orchestrated threats against exile journalists

Reporters Without Borders deplores a government-orchestrated campaign of threats and smears against journalists and human rights activists that is being waged above all through media controlled by Associated Newspapers of Ceylon Limited (ANCL), a state-owned company better known as “Lake House.”

The targets include Rohitha Bashana Abeywardane of Journalists for Democracy in Sri Lanka, a Reporters Without Borders partner organization, Dharmasiri Lankapeli of the Federation of Media Employees Trade Unions and Sunanda...

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Sri Lanka – With media gagged or threatened, no progress for freedom of information

Reporters Without Borders calls on all members of the Geneva-based United Nations Human Rights Council, which began its 19th session yesterday, to pass a resolution condemning the Sri Lankan government's violations of freedom of information and to demand an end to threats and violence against news media and human rights defenders in Sri Lanka.

“For more than a year we have been seeing new forms of censorship and a deterioration in journalists'...

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India – Start of 2012 marked by violations of freedom of information in world’s biggest democracy

Reporters Without Borders is concerned about a series of breaches of press freedom and attacks on journalists since the start of the year.

“We call on the central government to respond as quickly as possible to abuses by local authorities and officials towards the press. It is also essential that the authorities scrap their policy of monitoring the Internet, which is disproportionate and jeopardises press freedom,” the organization said.

Unwarranted desire to...

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INDIA: Cyclone Thane kills 16+ in south-east India

At least 16 people have been killed by winds of up to 140 kilometres per hour in south-east India. Cyclone Thane lashed the coast between Cuddalore in Tamil Nadu state and the former French colony of Pondicherry early on Friday. ...

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Sri Lanka’s ex-army chief Sarath Fonseka jailed for three years

A Sri Lankan court on Friday jailed former army chief Sarath Fonseka for three years for alleging that the president's brother had ordered the execution of surrendering Tamil rebels. ...

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Sri Lanka – Death threats against newspaper editor

Reporters Without Borders has written an open letter to President Mahinda Rajapaksa urging him to take whatever measures are necessary to protect Frederica Jansz, the editor of The Sunday Leader, and to ensure that those responsible for last week's death threats against her are arrested.

The threatening letter Jansz received on 27 October was prompted by her 2009 interview with Gen. Sarath Fonseka, a former army commander and presidential candidate in 2010,...

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Sri Lanka – Opposition newspaper editor badly beaten in Jaffna, left for dead

Reporters Without Borders is shocked to learn of yesterday evening's savage attack on Gnanasundaram Kuhanathan, 59, the editor of the Tamil-language daily Uthayan, who was beaten by unidentified men with iron bars in the northern city of Jaffna. He was rushed to hospital, where he was in a critical condition with serious head injuries and still unconscious.

“We demand a rapid and thorough investigation into this appalling crime,” Reporters Without Borders said....

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Sri Lanka intercepts boat carrying LTTE propaganda

Sri Lanka ...

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SR LANKA – PARIS AMBASSADOR INTERVIEW: Sri Lanka reconstruction could be better, new Paris ambassador says

Sr Lanka - Paris ambassador interview ...

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Sri Lanka – Galle literary festival appeal