NEW YORK, Dec. 15 (UPI) — The number of journalists jailed in Turkey and Egypt rose in 2015, a Committee to Protect Journalists report shows.
The report, released Tuesday, identified 199 journalists in prison worldwide in 2015, down from 221 last year. China has 49 in prison, leading the list for the second year in a row, with CPJ noting, “As President Xi Jinping continues his crackdown on corruption and as the country’s economic growth slows and its markets become more volatile, reporting on financial issues has taken on new sensitivity.” It identified journalist Wang Xiaolu of the Beijing business magazine Caijing, who was arrested in August after reporting a regulator was examining means by which security companies withdraw funds from stock markets.
The report of the New York-based CPJ said Egypt is now holding 23 journalists, up from 12 in 2014, because of a clampdown on dissent, and Turkey has 14 in custody, compared to seven in 2014, after a year of two general elections, involvement in the war in Syria and the breakdown of a ceasefire with the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party.
Iran, Vietnam, Ethiopia and Kyrgyzstan were also named in the report as countries that jail journalists to silence them. It noted the majority of journalists in jail are published online and not in print media, and that the number of imprisoned freelancers has declined.
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