Al-Wasit journalists get off without prison terms

Reporters Without Borders voiced relief today on learning that Al-Wasit editor Ayad al-Tamimi and reporter Ahmed Mutare Abass left a Baghdad court as free men at the end of a libel trial about several articles published last year criticising local police and judicial officials. The court did not impose any jail sentence. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- 17.08.2006 Two journalists go on trial while wave of arrests continues in north Reporters Without Borders appealed today for clemency in a trial that began yesterday in Baghdad in which Al-Wasit editor Ayad al-Tamimi and reporter Ahmed Mutare Abass face the possibility of long prison terms on charges of libelling the police, judicial and municipal authorities in Al-Kut, southeast of the capital. The trial concerns several articles published last year, including one criticising the judicial system and one about alleged police corruption. Arrested in April 2005 on the orders of the mayor of Kawit, they have already served six-month prison terms imposed by an Al-Kut court. They are now being tried on four counts of violating article 226 of the Iraqi criminal code. The case was finally transferred to a Baghdad court at their request on the grounds that the judges in Al-Kut were biased against them. “The situation of these two journalists reflects the current climate in Iraq, which is not very favourable for the development of a truly independent press,” Reporters Without Borders said. There has been a wave of arrests of journalists since the start of August, especially in the northern Kurdish region where around a dozen journalists covering peaceful demonstrations in the Sulaimaniya area have been arrested and some held for several hours. Cases have been reported of police destroying photographers' material and an Associated Press correspondent in the region was banned by the authorities from covering protests. Seven other journalists were arrested during a demonstration on 13 August in Sulaimaniya, which is one of the Kurdish region's most important cities. Two of them were still being held yesterday although it was hoped they would be freed soon following a call from a local journalists' defence group. Although detained journalists are for the most part being held for only several hours, this still poses a significant obstacle to their work.