CPJ recorded the highest number of jouornalists imprisoned globally for their work in 30 years, with 363 imprisoned as of December 1, 2022. Iranian authorities’ arrests of dozens of journalists amid a brutal crackdown on anti-state protests made it the world’s worst jailer of the press.
CPJ’s annual prison census shows that governments are resorting to retaliatory charges and the abuse of legal structures to punish the press, such as by crafting legislation with vague wording that criminalizes factual reporting.
Anti-state charges are used most frequently to imprison journalists, ranging from alleged terrorism to sharing information contrary to official narratives. Alarmingly, in 131 cases, journalists have been jailed with no charge registered at all, leaving them to languish behind bars with little legal recourse.
Some highlights:
- CPJ condemned a Hong Kong court’s harsh prison sentence for pro-democracy media entrepreneur Jimmy Lai—already facing a possible life sentence under the city’s national security law—on charges of fraud, and called for his release.
- CPJ called for the release of José Rubén Zamora, the founder and director of the elPeriódico newspaper, who has been in pretrial detention since July.
- CPJ honored five courageous journalists from around the world at it’s 32nd International Press Freedom Awards ceremony.
- CPJ joined with its partners in sending a letter calling for the U.S. government to drop criminal and extradition proceedings against WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, whose prosecution could set a harmful legal precedent by opening the way for journalists to be tried under the Espionage Act.
According to CJP’s data, this year, at least 130 imprisoned journalists were released, convictions were achieved in the murders of 12 journalists, and CPJ provided crucial assistance to more than 520 journalists in 49 countries.
In Iran, dozens of journalists are among the estimated 14,000 estimated 14,00 Iranians arrested during the crackdown on protests sparked by the death in police custody of Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old Kurdish woman arrested for allegedly breaking Iran’s hijab law.
In China, authorities tightened online censorship during recent over the government’s zero-COVID lockdown policies and several journalists are reported to have been briefly detained while covering the demonstrations. CPJ’s data also highlighted another theme: the ongoing repression of minorities.
Imprisoning journalists is just one measure of how authoritarian leaders try to strangle press freedom. Around the world, governments are also honing tactics like “fake news” laws, are using criminal defamation criminal defamation and vaguely worded legislation to criminalize journalism, are ignoring the rule of law and abusing the judicial system and are exploiting technology to spy on reporters and their families.
In countries ranging from Russia to Nicaragua to Afghanistan, independent media outlets have been gutted as reporters flee into exile or are intimidated into self-censorship.
