U.S. ranks sixth among countries jailing journalists
The United States has tied with Myanmar (the former Burma) for sixth place among countries that are holding the most journalists behind bars, according to a new report by the Committee to Protect Journalists. Each country is jailing five journalists. The United States is holding four Iraqi journalists in detention centers in Iraq and one Sudanese, a cameraman who works for Al Jazeera, at the United States Naval Base at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. None of the five have been charged with a specific crime.
This year, China topped the list of countries with the most journalists — 32 — in jail, many of them for activity on the Internet. This is the seventh year in a row in which China has led the list. Fifteen of the Chinese journalists are being held under national-security legislation for writing critically about the Communist Party online, the report said. A total of 125 writers, editors and photojournalists were held in jails around the world on Dec. 1, 2005, the report said. The tally is 3 higher than were held on Dec. 1, 2004, but it is not the highest number in the 25 years that the committee has been keeping track. The highest was 182 journalists jailed in 1995.
Source: Katharine Q. Seelye, The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/14/business/media/14journalists.html
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