Press Freedom
CPJ Updates
- New Guatemalan president must work hard to improve press freedom
- Governments around the world crack down on journalists covering COVID-19
- Philippines COVID-19 state of emergency includes prison time for spreading ‘false news’
- Trust deficit: About This Report
- Trust deficit: Guatemala's new president must overcome skepticism to improve press freedom
- Trust deficit: 'The goal was to silence me'
- Journalist Adnan Rashidi tortured, robbed in Iraqi Kurdistan
- Iraqi security forces seize journalist’s belongings for allegedly violating COVID-19 curfew
- Egypt expels Guardian reporter Ruth Michaelson over COVID-19 coverage
Reporter Without Borders
- Journalist threatened for exposing flaws in handling of coronavirus crisis
- Indian newspaper accused of “fake news” about lockdown’s impact on poor
- Coronavirus: RSF concerned for freedom of the press as Japan declares state of emergency
- Philippine journalist forced to apologize for criticizing coronavirus “inaction”
- Coronavirus threat to journalists in overcrowded Saudi prisons
- Covid-19 in Africa: RSF joins a coalition of civil society organizations to demand the release of imprisoned journalists on the continent
- Iraqi regulator wants to suspend Reuters over coronavirus reporting
- Egypt blocks online “fake news” about coronavirus
OPC Calls for China to Restore Three Wall Street Journal Visas
The Overseas Press Club calls on the Chinese Foreign Ministry to reinstate the visas of three Wall Street Journal reporters who have been ordered to leave China in retaliation for what authorities deemed a racist headline in a Journal opinion piece.
The three correspondents are Deputy Bureau Chief Josh Chin and reporter Chao Deng (both U.S. citizens) and reporter Philip Wen, an Australian national. All have been ordered to leave the country within five days.
The opinion column, which was published independent of the WSJ newsroom, referred to China as “The Sick Man of Asia” and it comes on the heels of a U.S. decision one day earlier designating five major Chinese media outlets as government entities. U.S. officials are increasingly concerned that Chinese journalists are being used to do government work, according to the Journal.
The Foreign Correspondents’ Club of China condemned the action against the WSJ correspondents as “an extreme and obvious attempt by the Chinese authorities to intimidate foreign news organizations.”
This marks the first outright expulsion of foreign correspondents since 1998, though nine journalists, including some from The New York Times, have been expelled through non-renewal of press credentials.
“Many of those evicted from China are fair and talented journalists who worked hard to bring unbiased, informative reports to their audiences and understand China,” said the FMCC.