Lighting operation reminds world that 110 journalists are in prison ( RSF ) November 14, 2002


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13 November 2002

International secretary

Communication

Lighting operation reminds world that 110 journalists are in prison

A moving convoy of French and foreign journalists demonstrated in front of five Paris embassies yesterday to demand the release of colleagues imprisoned in those countries. The lightning operation was staged on the eve of today¹s tribute by Reporters Without Borders to the 110 journalists in jail around the world for simply doing their job and to those who continue to do it despite major obstacles.

The Reporters Without Borders staff members, renamed the streets after the imprisoned journalists and daubed on the embassy gates the words: ³When you enter here, you enter a country where news is censored.²

They went first to the Burmese embassy, where they demanded news of journalists, especially U Win Tin, detained under the military regime. Next target was the embassy of Kazakhstan, where they called for the release of Sergei Duvanov, an opposition journalist, before going to the Chinese embassy to appeal for Gao Qinrong and 41 other journalists and cyber-dissidents to be freed.

At the Cuban embassy, the convoy symbolically renamed the embassy ³the prison of (jailed dissident journalist) Bernardo Arévalo Padrón² on the eve of the 15-16 November 12th Ibero-American Summit. Arévalo Padrón is serving a six-year sentence for accusing Cuban President Fidel Castro of breaking promises he made at the 1996 Ibero-American Summit to respect human rights.

At the Russian embassy, they demanded the release of journalist Grigory Pasko, who is in prison for reporting that the Russian military dumped liquid radioactive waste in the Sea of Japan.

The entire operation aimed to point out that press freedom is an important matter for citizens everywhere.

Details of the situation in the five targeted countries can be found on the Reporters Without Borders website, www.rsf.org, where petitions can be signed calling for the release of the journalists.

Don¹t wait to be deprived of news to stand up and fight for it!

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