ANHRI: Sudan secured its position amongst the countries most hostile to journalistic freedoms
Sudan suppresses journalistic freedoms and continues
to confiscate newspapers after print
Cairo, 5 September 2011
ANHRI condemned today the publicly ongoing targeting and intransigence of the Sudanese authorities towards journalistic freedoms, aiming at muzzling opinions and inflicting the heaviest financial losses upon the runners of the newspapers to disable them of issuing any copies.
In this respect, the Sudanese security forces seized the copies of the newspapers of “Al-Jarida” and “Al-Midan” in the early morning of Sunday 4 September 2011, and prevented them from distribution after having been printed. As usual, the authorities did not give any explanation for the confiscation.
Al-Jarida newspaper said in a statement issued yesterday, that the police harassments and the continuing confiscations are due to the initiative it took, of which it invited the writers of the Ajras Al-Hurriya newspaper to share their writings. An initiative that the Sudanese authorities did not consent to, thus, they seized the copies of the newspaper four times in the past two months.
It is worth noting that the Sudanese authorities canceled the license of six newspapers last July, among of which Ajras Al-Hurriya newspaper, under the pretext that some of its owners no longer have the right to issue newspapers in the North because they are now South Sudanese. All these repressive practices stress that the decision of the Sudanese president Al-Bashir to release all detained journalists was only a propaganda by a regime that publicly targets journalism.
“The Sudanese authorities do not respect freedom of opinion and expression at all. They perceive journalism and journalists as an enemy, and practice all sorts of repression and obstinacy in order to muzzle other opinons. Subsequently, there is no room to believe any promises or concealing statements by a repressive regime. Hence, we call on the organizations concerned with human rights to strongly pressure the Sudanese authorities in order to ensure journalistic freedoms” Said ANHRI.
