CPJ: 199 Journalists in Prison, 14 From Turkey

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According to the 2015 report of the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), 199 journalists are in prison due to their occupational activities.

In the report prepared by Elena Beiser, journalists from all over the world who are in prison as of December 1 have been listed.

The report states that “In China a record number of journalists are behind the bars and in 2015 the number of the imprisoned journalists in Egypt and Turkey has risen dramatically. Generally, there is a slight decline in the number of journalists all over the world in relation to the record numbers registered in the last three years.”

“Imprisoned journalists in Turkey have doubled”

In the report, the evaluation about Turkey is as follows:

“While the circumstances in media is getting worse also in Turkey, the number of imprisoned journalists in Turkey has doubled compared to last year and has reached 14. Turkey having the worst reputation for the last two consecutive years due to imprisoning journalists, has released dozens in 2014. Yet due to the new arrests in 2015 - including two general elections, an enhanced involvement in the Syrian civil war and breaking the very fragile cease-fire with the illegal warriors of the illegal Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) - Turkey ranks again as the fifth worst country all over the world.”

* There are 199 journalists all over the world who are imprisoned due to their occupational activities. This figure was 221 in last year.

* China with 49 journalists is the country with the highest number of imprisoned journalists. Egypt with 23 journalists and Iran with 19 journalists follow China.

* Turkey is at the fifth rank with 14 imprisoned journalists following China, Egypt, Iran and Eritrea.

Imprisoned Journalists in Turkey

* Imprisoned journalists listed in the report were, Hatice Duman from Atılım daily, Mustafa Gök from Bread and Justice,Seyithan Akyüz from Azadiya Welat daily, Kenan Karavil from Radio World ,Erdal Süsem from Eylül Arts and Literature Magazine, Mehmet Baransu from True Agenda daily, Muhammed Rasul from Vice News, Gültekin Avcı from Bugün daily, Cevheri Güven and  Murat Çapan Nokta Magazine, İdris Yılmaz from Dicle News Agency (DİHA), Vildan Atmaca from Women’s News Agency (JINHA) and ,Can Dündar and Erdem Gül from Cumhuriyet daily.

* According to the annual prison researches of CPJ, as of December 1, there has not been a single journalist imprisoned due to occupational activities on the North and South America Continents for the second time since 1990, the first time was in 2011.

* The rate of the freelance journalists in prison is 28% and declining since 2011.

109 of the imprisoned journalists all over the world are Internet journalists.

* All over the world, 109 of the imprisoned journalists are Internet journalists and 83 are printed press journalists.

* Besides China, Egypt and Turkey, there has been a rise in the number of imprisoned journalists also in Bangladesh, Gambia, India and Saudi Arabia.

* Countries which had no imprisoned journalists in 2014 and therefore were not on the prison inventory yet became included in 2015 have been Turkmenistan and United Arab Emirates.  

*CPJ is also informed about two journalists who did not want their cases to be announced to the public by their families with expectations of getting released on mute bargain.

Click here to see the original report of CPJ.

According to data from BIA Media Monitoring Report 2015, 3rd Quarter, 24 journalists and nine distributors and as of today 30 journalists are in prison in Turkey. (EA/DG)