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Politics : PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: GROUND ZERO™ who wrote (755837)	12/8/2006 8:38:45 AM
From: DuckTapeSunroof	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 769670

China leads backlash against Internet freedom, media group says dpa German Press Agency Published: Friday December 8, 2006 rawstory.com Beijing- China is leading the fight by authoritarian states to control internet freedom and remains the world's leading jailer of journalists, a media rights' group said on Friday. One in three of the 134 journalists jailed worldwide is an internet blogger, online editor or web-based reporter, said the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ). The total number of journalists jailed for their work increased for the second year running, and China led the way with 31 recorded in prison on December 1, the group said in an annual report posted on its website, www.cpj.org. Cuba, Eritrea and Ethiopia followed China with a total of 65 journalists jailed in the three countries. Print reporters, editors and photographers remained the largest category, with 67 cases in 2006, but the group also categorized 49 of those imprisoned as Internet journalists. "We're at a crucial juncture in the fight for press freedom because authoritarian states have made the internet a major front in their effort to control information," CPJ Executive Director Joel Simon said in the statement. "China is challenging the notion that the internet is impossible to control or censor, and if it succeeds there will be far-ranging implications, not only for the medium but for press freedom all over the world," Simon said. About 75 per cent of cases in China involved charges made under "vague 'anti-state' laws", the CPJ report said. The group recorded 19 cases involving internet journalists in China this year. Among those jailed in China is Shi Tao, a journalist who was sentenced to 10 years in prison for posting online details of propaganda department instructions for state media during an anniversary of the 1989 military crackdown on pro-democracy protestors. The group said it also found an "increasing number of journalists held without any charge or trial at all," especially in Eritrea. Myanmar (Burma) is fifth on the CPJ list, with seven journalists imprisoned. Uzbekistan is holding five journalists in prison, while the United States, Azerbaijan, and Burundi each hold three journalists. Among those imprisoned in Myanmar are two journalists jailed in March for violating a ban on photographing the new capital, Pyinmana, CPJ said. The United States has imprisoned two journalists without charge or trial: Associated Press photographer Bilal Hussein, held for eight months in Iraq; and Al-Jazeera cameraman Sami al-Haj, who was arrested five years ago in Pakistan and is now held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. The longest-serving journalists on the CPJ list are Chinese dissidents Chen Renjie and Lin Youping, who were jailed in 1983 for publishing a pamphlet called Ziyou Bao (Freedom Report). A co-defendant, Chen Biling, was later executed. © 2006 dpa German Press Agency