News

October 24, 2025 - Sri Lanka/India -  The press-freedom organization Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has issued a public call urging Sri Lanka’s authorities to halt the systematic harassment of veteran Tamil photo-journalist Kanapathipillai Kumanan, who has long documented human-rights violations in the country’s northeast. Kumanan, based in the Mullaitivu district, has covered issues such as military land seizures, mass grave exhumations, and enforced disappearances affecting Tamil-speaking communities since the end of the civil war in 2009. According to RSF, the journalist has been subjected to a renewed campaign of intimidation that appears to be directly...

October 24, 2025 - USA -  Federal officials from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) launched a public reprimand of Chicago Tribune reporter Gregory Royal Pratt after he posted on X that agents from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) were operating on 26th Street in Chicago’s Little Village neighborhood. DHS Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs Tricia McLaughlin reposted the message and asked, “Why is a Chicago Tribune reporter telegraphing the location of federal law enforcement?” The episode quickly ignited criticism from press freedom advocates and journalism organizations, who argued the government’s framing risks suppressing legitimate...

October 24, 2025 - Lebanon -  Lebanese journalist Sami Kleib has cautioned that although officials are offering many assurances of stability, they may be misleading given what he perceives as an imminent escalation in Israeli military activity in Lebanon. He states that his sources suggest South Lebanon and other regions used by Hezbollah or considered its base of support are likely to face intensified operations from Israel. Kleib argues that instead of broad open warfare, Israel appears to be planning a calibrated plan of action aimed at degrading Hezbollah’s military-political capabilities. He expects a surge...

October 24, 2025 - General -  The International Press Institute (IPI) has announced its 2025 recipients of the Press Freedom Hero and Free Media Pioneer awards.  Among those honored is the late Palestinian photo-journalist Mariam Abu Dagga, recognized posthumously as one of this year’s Press Freedom Heroes. The Free Media Pioneer Award for 2025 goes to independent media outlets in Hungary, acknowledged for their inventiveness and perseverance under intensified political and economic pressures. Mariam Abu Dagga, who documented events in Gaza and contributed to major international news agencies, was killed in August 2025 while covering...

October 24, 2025 - Crimea -  Crimean-Tatar citizen journalist and political prisoner Amet Suleymanov, who is serving a 12-year sentence in a Russian maximum-security penal colony, has seen his health deteriorate rapidly under incarceration. His wife, Lilia Liumanova, reported that during her visit on 24 June 2025 to the detention facility in Vladimir, Russia, she observed dangerously elevated blood pressure reaching approximately 230 mmHg and visible bodily symptoms, including a widespread rash and dental problems. Suleymanov suffers from serious and chronic heart conditions, including arterial and mitral valve insufficiency, and had previously been recommended for...

October 23, 2025 - Russia -  Ukrainian journalist Anastasiia Hlukhovska has reportedly been held by Russian authorities for over two years without formal charges while enduring brutal treatment, an investigation by Slidstvo.Info revealed. On 20 August 2023, Hlukhovska was taken from her apartment in Melitopol by officers of the Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation (FSB), who seized her electronic equipment and institutional records. Nevertheless, Russian authorities later claimed they had no information about her detention. Sources interviewed by Slidstvo.Info, including a fellow detainee who shared a cell with Hlukhovska in a basement facility...

October 23, 2025 - Palestine -  Palestinian journalist Plestia Alaqad has published her debut memoir, The Eyes of Gaza: A Diary of Resilience, which draws directly from diary entries she wrote during the first 45 days of the 2023 Israeli assault on the Gaza Strip after the October 7 attack by Hamas. Her book opens a raw and immediate window on life under bombardment, displacement, and survival. At just 21 when the war broke out, Alaqad had already begun using social-media video dispatches to tell the world about daily life in Gaza. Then her narrative...

October 23, 2025 - Turkey -  Journalist Ercüment Akdeniz was ordered released from pre-trial detention by the Istanbul 26th High Criminal Court, after spending roughly eight months (243 days) behind bars in connection with an investigation tied to the Peoples' Democratic Congress (HDK). Akdeniz had been detained since 21 February 2025 under charges that included alleged “membership in a terrorist organization”, linked to his reporting and association with HDK-linked persons. During his hearing on 23 October, the court released him under judicial control, imposing a travel ban rather than the continuation of his detention. The...

October 23, 2025 - Afghanistan -  An Afghan journalist named Javed Qureshi was arrested by Pakistani police in the city of Attock, as part of a broader enforcement campaign targeting undocumented Afghan refugees. According to an audio message recorded by Qureshi, he was taken into custody without prior notice by police in the Attock district. The detention occurs amid heightened tension along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border following recent clashes involving the Taliban and Pakistani security forces, which triggered an increase in round-ups and forced deportations of Afghans residing in Pakistan. Qureshi’s arrest is consistent with a...

October 23, 2025 - India -  India’s national human-rights watchdog, the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), has taken suo motu cognizance of media-reported assaults on journalists in three states — Kerala, Manipur, and Tripura. The incidents occurred on 30 August 2025 in Kerala and Manipur and on 21 September 2025 in Tripura. In each case, the journalist victims were hospitalized, and FIRs were filed. In Tripura, a journalist attending a clothes-distribution event organized by a political party in Hezamara, West Tripura, was attacked by a group wielding sticks and sharp weapons and had his motorcycle...

October 23, 2025 - Ukraine/Russia -  Two Ukrainian media workers, journalist Olena Hubanova and cameraman Yevhen Karmazin, were killed in a Russian drone strike in the city of Kramatorsk, Donetsk region. The attack, carried out using a Lancet-type unmanned aerial vehicle, targeted the area on a working day as they were carrying out their reporting duties for Freedom TV Channel. According to the regional military administration, the journalists died at the scene, and the incident is now under official investigation to determine further details, including whether they were deliberately targeted. The deaths of Hubanova and...

October 22, 2025 - Philippines - Radio broadcaster Noel Bellen Samar, 54, was ambushed Monday morning while driving along Maharlika Highway in Barangay Morera, Guinobatan, Albay province. The unidentified gunman fired at him, striking his chest and abdomen. Samar was transported to a Legazpi medical facility, but succumbed to his injuries on Tuesday after undergoing surgery. Samar worked with Kadunong ITV and DWIZ News FM – institutions that provide critical information across the Bicol region. His death was swiftly condemned by the Presidential Task Force on Media Security (PTFoMS), which described the attack as not...

October 22, 2025 - Turkey -  A Turkish court has handed a 10-month suspended sentence to journalist Asuman Aranca for publishing parts of an expert report in the murder case of far-right figure Sinan Ateş. The sentence was given by the İstanbul 2nd Criminal Court of First Instance; though the term was pronounced, it is suspended and will only be enforced if Aranca commits a similar offense within the next five years. The case centers on the December 30, 2022, killing of Sinan Ateş in Ankara. Ateş had been a former leader of the ultranationalist...

October 22, 2025 - Turkey -  Journalist Öznur Değer, the news editor of the Kurdish-women-run agency JINNEWS, has been sentenced by a Turkish court in Mardin to three years, four months, and fifteen days in prison. The conviction stems from indictments that accuse Değer of “making propaganda for a terrorist organization,” linked to her coverage and social-media commentary about a drone strike in northern Syria that killed two Kurdish journalists. Değer’s arrest came in February 2025 when anti-terror police raided her family home in the Kızıltepe district, detaining her without the presence of her lawyers....

October 21, 2025 - Palestine -  Palestinian journalist Ahmad Abu Mutayr was killed on 20 October 2025 in an Israeli strike on Deir al-Balah, central Gaza, despite an active ceasefire agreement. Mutayr was reporting from the area when the attack occurred, marking yet another journalist casualty in a conflict that has claimed the lives of dozens of media workers. His body was later transferred to Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital, where colleagues, family members, and fellow journalists gathered to pay their respects. Mutayr’s death comes amid a growing outcry from international press freedom organizations, human rights monitors,...

October 21, 2025 - Palestine - A fragile ceasefire that began on 10 October 2025 has eased large-scale combat in Gaza and the West Bank, yet journalists in both areas continue to face severe dangers. The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) reports that despite reduced bombardments, attacks, arrests, and harassment of reporters persist. In Gaza, two journalists were killed and another was injured since the ceasefire took effect. One succumbed to gunfire amid internal armed clashes in Gaza City, and another died in an airstrike at a media production facility. Meanwhile, in the West Bank,...

October 21, 2025 - UK - The club formerly known as Huddersfield Town has officially renamed its press box at the Accu Stadium to the “Mel Booth Press Box,” in recognition of Mel Booth’s distinguished 35-year career covering the club for the Huddersfield Daily Examiner. Booth spent more than three decades reporting on the club’s fortunes, becoming a familiar and respected presence among fans, players, and staff alike. His journalism captured decades of change—from promotions and relegations to financial upheaval—and helped document the rich history of the club. His coverage extended beyond match reports, encompassing...

October 21, 2025 - Sahel -  In recent years, the Sahel region—particularly in Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger—has seen increasing repression of independent expression. Journalists, civil society activists, and ordinary citizens face harassment, imprisonment, and even torture simply for raising critical views. In Burkina Faso, journalist Idrissa Barry was abducted in March 2025 by men identifying themselves as state gendarmes. His detention followed his public criticism of human-rights abuses by armed forces and civilian defense volunteers. In Mali, anti-corruption campaigner Clément Dembélé has been jailed since November 2023 despite a judge having dismissed his case, and...

October 21, 2025 - Ethiopia -  Journalists reporting from Ethiopia’s Tigray region continue to face grave threats even after the formal conclusion of the country’s civil war. According to the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), freelance reporters and media crews are being met with detention, raids, equipment seizure, and direct life-threatening abuse. In one documented incident, a camera operator for the regional broadcaster Tigray Broadcasting Services (TBS) was singled out by an armed militia member who pointed a gun and shouted, “Stop filming or I will shoot you!” when the crew attempted to report on...

October 21, 2025 - Greece/Turkey -  Greek state-broadcaster journalist Nikos Aslanidis was turned away by Turkish immigration authorities on 21 October 2025 while attempting to join a press delegation in Istanbul. He had been traveling with a 100-member‐strong group from the Macedonia-Thrace Journalists’ Association, intended to participate in cultural visits, including to the Hagia Sophia, and engage with the Ecumenical Patriarch. Turkish authorities reportedly invoked a vague classification—describing him as a “national threat”—to refuse entry, without offering a detailed explanation or referencing criminal charges. Aslanidis works for ERT (Hellenic Broadcasting Corporation), and his exclusion has sparked...

October 21, 2025 - Palestine - A recent online exchange highlights escalating tensions between Israel’s military and Gaza-based media figures. Gaza-resident photographer and correspondent Fadi al‑Wahidi, who worked with Al Jazeera, publicly mourned his uncle Taj al‑Din al‑Wahidi, a senior field commander in the Palestinian organization Hamas’s Jabalia battalion, killed in operations in northern Gaza. In a social-media post, al-Wahidi announced his uncle’s passing, invoking religious language and the role his relative played in the conflict. In response, the IDF’s Arabic-language spokes-team publicly ridiculed al-Wahidi’s professional status, describing him and others in similar roles as “young men … sometimes...

October 20, 2025 – Russia – Russian investigators from the Investigative Committee of Russia have completed an inquiry into a foiled plot to assassinate Margarita Simonyan, the editor-in-chief of the state-backed broadcaster RT. According to official statements, the conspiracy was orchestrated by a neo-Nazi terrorist cell linked to the banned organization “National Socialism/White Power”. Investigators say the cell’s leader, Mikhail Balashov, in collaboration with co-conspirator Egor Savelyev, agreed to murder Simonyan in exchange for approximately US $50,000. The scheme reportedly involved the collection of detailed information on Simonyan’s whereabouts and movements. Weapons and ammunition were...

October 20, 2025 – China/Africa – A major media training event kicked off in Beijing on 17 October 2025, where journalists from across Africa and other nations wrapped around the National Radio and Television Administration (NRTA) of China and the Research Training Institute (RTI). The two-week seminar, scheduled to run until 30 October 2025, brings together media professionals from countries including The Gambia, Nigeria, Botswana, Jordan, Turkey, Panama, and Barbados. In his opening remarks, NRTA official Chang Jin emphasized China’s view of the media’s role in shaping public opinion and cultural narratives, stressing themes of...

October 20, 2025 – Nigeria – Network Against Corruption and Trafficking (NACAT) has raised serious concerns over the continued detention of journalist and activist Fejiro Oliver in Delta State, pointing to what it calls a “coordinated effort” by state actors to bypass judicial rulings and suppress critical journalism. On 16 October 2025, a Federal High Court in Asaba granted bail to Fejiro Oliver in a case brought by the Delta State government. However, while he was arranging bail terms, the state government allegedly secured a reproduction warrant for re-arraignment before a Magistrate’s Court in Asaba....

October 20, 2025 – Russia - A Russian journalist detained in Azerbaijan earlier this year has been released and has returned to Russia, the Russian Foreign Ministry announced. The individual, Igor Kartavykh, executive director of the Russian state-affiliate agency Sputnik Azerbaijan, was arrested in June in Baku as part of a broader operation targeting the outlet amid escalating diplomatic tensions between Moscow and Baku. Kartavykh’s release reportedly follows high-level diplomatic discussions between Vladimir Putin and Ilham Aliyev held in Dushanbe. One source cited by Reuters suggested the deal included the release of a detained Azerbaijani...