Reporters Without Borders calls for case against journalist to be dropped

Reporters Without Borders has urged Algerian courts to dismiss a case against journalist Hassan Bourras, jailed for two years on 6 November then temporarily freed on 2 December after the plaintiff failed to appear in court. The case, which also saw Bourras banned from practising his profession for five years, constituted "one of the worst violations of press freedom in Algeria in years," said Robert Ménard, secretary-general of Reporters Without Borders. Bourras, correspondent in El Bayadh, western Algeria, for dailies including the Oran regional paper El Djazaïri and national daily El Youm, was jailed for defamation by a local court over two articles about corruption he wrote for El Djazaïri. A court in Saida temporarily released him on 2 December at the request of his lawyers. Since the plaintiff did not show up for the case, it was postponed until 23 December. Calling for the case to be dismissed, Ménard said "Bourras should be given back his freedom and be allowed to resume work as a journalist as soon as possible. It would be a travesty of justice for a journalist to be sentenced so severely for defamation when he was only doing his job." The journalist, who also works for the Algerian League for the Defence of Human Rights, had revealed in one article that the wife of the local prosecutor had forged an administrative document to get herself hired. In another article he revealed the existence of a land scandal implicating ranking officials in El Bayadh. Bourras has kept all the evidence in the two cases and has testimonies that confirm his claims.