Activist jailed after writing article about prison conditions

Reporters Without Borders protested today at the arrest of a rights activist who denounced conditions at Amman's Jweidah Prison in the latest issue of the Lebanese-published magazine Al-Adab, which has been banned from sale in Jordan. The author, Hisham Bustani, was arrested on 24 December and is reportedly being held at Jweidah. His article was based on a previous five-day imprisonment there a few months ago. "This jail is becoming notorious for the number of prisoners of conscience it holds and the abuses that occur there," said Reporters Without Borders secretary-general Robert Ménard in a letter to Jordanian prime minister Ali Abu Al-Ragheb calling for Bustani's immediate release and an end to the ban on the magazine. Jordanians had a basic right to be informed, he said. Bustani is a member of the Union of Professional Associations, which campaigns against normalising relations with Israel and was outlawed by the Jordanian government earlier this year. The November-December issue of the Al-Adab, a literary magazine, mostly deals with censorship in Egypt. It has also been banned in Kuwait.