Sudan security services suspend and confiscate newspapers
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Version 0 of 1. Sudan’s intelligence services confiscated the print-runs of 10 daily newspapers on 25 May against what the International Press Institute (IPI) calls “the backdrop of an ongoing brutal security campaign against the freedoms of speech and the press”. The country’s National Intelligence and Security Services (NISS) also suspended the publication of four of the newspapers - Al-Intibaha, AkhirLahzah, Al-Jareeda and Al-Khartoum - indefinitely. The other six were Al-Sudani, Al-Akhbar, Alwan, Al-Youm al-Tali, Al-Rai ala’am and Al-Tayyar. Some of the titles are regarded as pro-government. The editor-in-chief of Al-Intibaha is a senior member of the ruling party and the head of the government-controlled Sudanese Journalists’ Union. The mass confiscation repeated a similar action by the NISS on 16 February when the print runs of 14 daily papers were seized. IPI, the global press freedom organisation, argues that the two confiscations stand out as the most egregious press freedom violations in Sudan’s modern history. It says that NISS exercises rigorous censorship on newspapers and other media outlets by sending messages to editors instructing them not to discuss issues it deems to be beyond “red-lines” related to “national security”. Since the beginning of the year, NISS has confiscated around 52 print runs of Sudan’s papers without giving editors any reason and without any judicial due process. Unsurprisingly, the confiscations and government interference in the press and have led to a sharp decline in the distribution of print newspapers. But some Sudanese journalists have set up online outlets in order to report freely. Sources: IPI/Sudan Tribune |