The conflict in Ukraine with all these absurd symbols (Vladimir Kazanevsky for Nebelspalter)
Ukrainian Vladimir Kazanevsky and Hungarian Gabor Papai were announced as the winners of the Kofi Annan Courage in Cartooning Award at a ceremony at the Maison de la Paix in Geneva and presented by the Freedom Cartoonists Foundation. Jury : Kenneth Roth, Human Rights Watch (president), Sami Kanaan, City of Geneva and cartoonists Ann Telnaes (USA), Kak (France) and Chappatte (Switzerland). The portraits below were done by True Heroes Films (THF)
Vladimir Kazanevsky
Vladimir Kazanevsky, Ukraine’s leading cartoonist, was working in his studio early in the morning of 24 February when he heard loud explosions near the airport in Kyiv. He and his wife fled to western Ukraine, along with a huge wave of families fleeing the bombings. From there they went to Presov, a town in Slovakia with a community of artists.
Deprived of his drawing materials, catalogues and books, which he had to leave behind in Kyiv, Kazanevsky continues to draw relentlessly: Putin in action, on a tank or on the bow of the Titanic. “Autocrats and dictators are afraid of our cartoons, and they are right, because our drawings are powerful weapons,” he says.
Fiercely determined to continue the fight against Russian aggression, the 71-year-old sees his work as an act of resistance. An act of defence of freedom of expression against war propaganda.
Gábor Pápai
For several years, Hungarian cartoonist Gàbor Pàpai and his newspaper Népszava – the only opposition daily still alive in Budapest – have been the subject of attacks and legal proceedings by the authorities – even though Hungary is part of the European Union.
This cartoon, “The Chronicle” by Gábor Pápai, published in Hungary’s daily newspaper Népszava on 28 April shows the Hungarian National Public Health Centre’s chief doctor looking at Jesus on the cross and suggesting that many people who had deceased from the coronavirus had already been likely to die because they had suffered from pre-existing conditions.
It was intended to ridicule Hungary’s chief health figure for having tried to minimise the number of deaths solely attributable to the coronavirus in Hungary and, by extension, to mock the government’s handling of the crisis.
“Its depiction and use of Jesus on a cross sparked an outcry from the representatives of the Christian Democrat Party, an ally of the ruling Fidesz, to the point that the Secretary of State for persecuted Christian communities, Tristan Azbej, accused Gábor Pápai of blasphemy and threatened to sue him or Népszava,” as Reporters Without Borders, who came to the defense of Papai, explains.
The Catholic religion, the fight against Covid or simply Hungarian history are all pretexts for prosecution in a country ranked 92nd in the world press freedom index by Reporters Without Borders (RSF). This shameful ranking has been deteriorating ever since Viktor Orbán became Prime Minister, putting all independent media in great difficulty. Some, like Népszava, are directly threatened with extinction. Gàbor Pàpai, far from being intimidated, continues to critically observe and draw all political actors in Hungary.
To mark the UN Refugee Agency’s 70th anniversary, award-winning cartoonist Hani Abbas has created seven images that will be sold as digital assets to raise funds for Afghanistan.
Syrian-Palestinian cartoonist Hani Abbas, 44, was born and grew up in Yarmouk, a Palestinian refugee camp in the southern suburbs of the Syrian capital Damascus. From the late 1990s his cartoons appeared in publications and exhibitions in Syria and across the Middle East, before he and his family fled the conflict in 2012 and eventually settled in Switzerland as refugees.
Since then, Abbas’s work – which tackles themes of injustice, loss, and the human cost of conflict – has featured in publications including Le Temps and La Liberté in Switzerland and France’s Le Monde. He is also a member of the Cartooning for Peace organization, a network of press cartoonists committed to promoting freedom and democracy. In 2014, Abbas received the International Editorial Cartoon Prize in Geneva. [see: https://www.trueheroesfilms.org/thedigest/laureates/01DCF77A-3DEA-97F4-CE95-6BD185538207]
To mark the 70th anniversary of UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, Abbas has teamed up with national partner association Switzerland for UNHCR to launch the agency’s first-ever NFT (non-fungible token) fundraising sale. Abbas has created seven cartoons, from which ten copies of each will be converted into unique digital assets and sold as NFTs on the OpenSea online marketplace to raise funds for UNHCR’s Afghanistan crisis response.
Ahead of the start of the sale on 4 November, UNHCR spoke with Abbas and asked him about his life in Syria, his experiences as a refugee, and the meaning behind the images he has created.
What was your early life like growing up in Yarmouk camp?
Yarmouk is called a camp, but it’s really a part of the city with buildings, streets, and all the normal services. Growing up there was something nice and something hard. A lot of people in a small area; many pupils in the school. We had a beautiful, funny life – hard, but beautiful. Sometimes hard memories become nice when you look back. When I remember it now, I have nostalgia about that time. I remember my friends, my neighbourhood, my street, my family home.
When did you first show a talent for drawing?
When I was a child, I loved to draw. I drew everything, and I drew on everything – I was drawing on the walls, in school textbooks, on my body – everywhere. This is a child’s job! I loved drawing and when I was in school, my art teacher supported me and entered my work in a UN children’s drawing prize which I won twice, when I was 13 and 14. Those prizes gave me the power and the belief to continue drawing – I felt like I had something to say through my drawing. You can explain your story, your feelings, your ideas.
Did you always want to be a cartoonist?
No. At first it was anything, but when I was around 18, I started thinking about cartoons because I saw a lot in the newspapers, and on the walls of the camp. The walls were like our newspaper in the camp. Yarmouk was one big newspaper. In 1998 I published my first cartoon in a Palestinian magazine, then had exhibitions in the camp, in Damascus, Aleppo and Lebanon. I started connecting with newspapers – that’s how it goes. At the same time, I was also a teacher in an elementary school in Damascus.
What themes do you address in your cartoons?
My early cartoons were about Palestine, Palestinian refugees in the Middle East. More political than funny because it was difficult for me to draw something funny. I always go towards tragedy and darkness because I draw what I’m feeling. I’m trying to explain about myself and my people. At that time, I was just drawing and there was no problem for me, but when the conflict started, you had to take your life in your hands when you drew.
I’m still drawing now. Drawing in a safe place like Switzerland is good, you have total freedom. But you lose the sense of danger, the challenge. For me I did my best drawings under the bombs. I lost a big part of my power when I left Syria, but I still have the power of memory.
“The memories occupy my mind all the time.”
How did the conflict affect you personally?
I moved many times in Syria starting from March 2011 until December 2012 when I left. The last six months were very difficult to live under the bombs all the time. At that time, we would hear three sounds. The first was the sound of the shell when it was launched. The second was the sound of the shell above us in the sky. The third sound was the sound the of the explosion on the ground, or in a building. I was drawing all the time, but when I heard that first sound, I would lift my pencil and wait, thinking: ‘maybe this is my last drawing’. If I heard the third sound, that meant I was still alive. I’m lucky because I always heard all three sounds, but many thousands of Syrian people around me never heard the third sound.
You managed to escape Syria, first to Lebanon and then Switzerland. How did your life change?
Before, my family was all in the same place, now everyone is spread around the world. I’m here in Switzerland, in Geneva, my brother is in Cologne in Germany, my parents and two other brothers are in Sweden, and another brother is in Madrid, in Spain. It’s not easy to connect with them. It’s good we have social media and video calls, but it’s not the same. My kids are speaking French now, my brother’s kids are speaking German, Swedish, another Spanish. When they meet now it’s not easy to connect with so many languages, different cultures, different educations. We will lose our family tree. The branches have been cut off and are drifting down the river in different directions. But Switzerland is very good for my kids, without any problems and without any bad memories, without any dangers in the future. For me, it’s okay. I’m working here, I’m still drawing, I’m feeling good – life is good – but the memories occupy my mind all the time.
The images you’ve created for the NFT sale are part of a series you call “Windows”. What significance do windows have in your work?
What is the meaning of windows in my heart? They are our windows to see the country, to see people – to connect with them and hear them. In 2011, after four months of the conflict I drew the first window – a destroyed building with just a window still standing, and a young man waiting outside with a flower to see his love, who was gone. It represents what we’ve lost. I’ve drawn other figures who have left everything else behind but take a window with them, because the window is their memory. I have my own ideas and feelings about the images, but I hope everyone who looks at them can see the effect of war on people.
“I hope all the people who have problems in their countries can get out.”
The money raised in the sale will be used to support the people of Afghanistan. How did you feel watching recent events there?
It felt familiar for me because we were – we’re still – like them. The same problems, the same feelings, the same stories. In the news we always heard about the politics, but we didn’t know what was happening to normal people. For me, I hope all the people who have problems in their countries can get out. I support people who want to get out if they have dreams, if they want to protect their kids.
You’re used to publishing your cartoons in newspapers. How do you feel about them being turned into unique digital assets and sold as NFTs instead?
I don’t have any experience of this – I just do the drawings! But every cartoonist wants their work to be seen, and I support these new ideas. Anything that will help people and explain the hard conditions and problems they face, and allow other people to support them. It’s a new idea, and when I heard about it, I loved it. We hope now it succeeds in focusing attention on the problems of [Afghans], and makes money for them of course, because they need it. Sometimes, to make a little bit of change in people’s lives they just need a tent or a little bit of food, a bit of support or a little education.
Kyra Dupont in Geneva Solutions of 23 February 2021 goes into the history that links Geneva and cartoons: “Drawings for peace, the role of Geneva” Geneva is said to be the cradle of comics thanks to Rodolphe Töpffer who was the first to put words on an illustrative sequence in the 1830s. Geneva has remained a vivid breeding ground for cartoons since then. (Credit: Patrick Chappatte) “Töpffer pioneered the genre, his work was a laboratory,” confirmed Zep at the opening of the exhibition, The comic strip, a Geneva invention? last November. The comic artist and creator of the bestselling Titeuf series discovered him at the age of 20 and admits that it is difficult to escape his influence for a cartoonist living in Geneva.
Since then, Switzerland remains the country with the most important press organizations’ ratio in the world compared to its population.
…..there is indeed a Geneva breeding ground for comic strips and press cartoons, two universes which cohabit in “a kinship never totally assumed, a bit like cousins from first-generation families with their own associations, their own interests, but both take part in this great wealth of talent and artists in a very small area with a very small population,” explains Patrick Chappatte, press cartoonist for Le Temps or the Boston Globe, among others. Indeed, political cartoonists are doing more than well in French-speaking Switzerland between Mix and Remix or Burki, which have now disappeared, but also Barrigues, Herman, Benedict, the new artists of the satirical newspaper Vigousse or the recent application La Torche 2.0 which develops press cartoons on smartphones.
Chappatte recalls that the press cartoons developed hand in hand with press freedom and democracy. Today we cannot imagine the front page of our newspapers without them.
“As luck would have it, today we are in a period where press cartoons are heckled and democracy is being questioned everywhere. We are living in a paradoxical era where we can say absolutely everything and send each other the worst things on social networks, and at the same time we bear a cautious attitude in the traditional media, companies under economic pressure, and exercise great caution in crisis management. On the one hand a precautionary principle is applied to humour and opinion, and on the other hand the real reactionaries are completely unleashed on social networks.”
The filtering of the media, the real professional entities, is what is most damaging to democracy and freedom of expression, according to the cartoonist who had to stop drawing for The New York Times when it decided to no longer publish daily political cartoons in its international edition in June 2019. “They took the easiest path in order to not have problems with political cartoons in the future… Did we just invent preventive censorship ? This, in the end, is about democracy,” reacted Chappatte in his Ted talk, “A free world needs satire”.
This year, Chappatte was also awarded the Fondation pour Genève prize for his outstanding contribution to the influence of Geneva and his commitment to freedom of press and expression. “It’s quite a strong message at a time when press cartoons are being called into question,” says Chappatte, who regrets that the sanitary crisis has delayed the Freedom Cartoonists Foundation’s price to May 2021.
“The extremists, the autocrats, the dictators and all the ideologues of the world cannot stand humour…We need political cartoons more than ever and we need humour.
On the occasion of International Women Human Rights Defenders Day (29 November) and marking this year’s 16 Days Campaign to combat gender based violence, Front Line Defenders presents a new edition of Cypher: https://www.frontlinedefenders.org/sites/default/files/cypher05.pdf , the digital monthly comic magazine featuring stories of human rights defenders from around the world. This edition features stories of WHRDs working for accountability in the context of the rights of women and girls, with a focus on GBV, from Zimbabwe, Transnistria/Moldova, Tonga and Argentina. [see also: https://humanrightsdefenders.blog/2020/07/23/new-cypher-comics-for-human-rights-defenders/]
Also in celebration of International Women Human Rights Defenders Day the International Service for Human Rights (ISHR) in Geneva organises an on-line ‘exhibition “The Gaze that Subverts” of pieces by the painter Z.
Each painting tells a story of a woman or women who, in defiance of patriarchal structures and authoritarian repression, occupy public space in China in their fight for justice.
Z’s paintings are both prompted by, and provide – in their embodiment, the bent torso, the flexed muscle – a response to, a central question of rights defence: ‘How do we change unjust power relationships with the all-too-scarce resources we have at our disposal?’
Front Line Defenders has released the fourth edition of the monthly digital magazine, Cypher <http://www.frontlinedefenders.org/cypher> , featuring stories of the 2020 Front Line Defenders Regional Award Winners – HRDs from Mauritania, Sri Lanka, Colombia, Armenia and Iraq.
If you are interested in an annual subscription to receive printed editions of Cypher, please email campaigns@frontlinedefenders.org, with ‘Subscription’ in the subject line, and you will be sent more information about options.
In July 2020, Front Line Defenders launched Cypher (@cypher_comics on Instagram), a digital comics magazine that advances the organization’s storytelling and narrative framing work in collaboration with and in support of HRDs. Working with artists from around the world, including the award-winning visual storyteller, Beldan Sezen, as creative director, the ’zine is a monthly publication featuring stories of HRDs, their work and the challenges they face. [see: https://humanrightsdefenders.blog/2020/07/23/new-cypher-comics-for-human-rights-defenders/]
If you are interested in an annual subscription to receive printed editions of Cypher, please email campaigns@frontlinedefenders.org, with ‘Subscription’ in the subject line, and you will be sent more information about options.
Cypher 02 (published on 18 July 2020) features an audio interview with Palestinian HRD and artist Hafez Omar – listen to the interview by clicking on the ‘Hafez Talks’ buttons when viewing the comcis in the ‘zine viewer below (the PDF file does not support the audio files).
Zunar’s latest book (July 2019), entitled Fight through Cartoons: My Story of Harassment, Intimidation & Jail (Singapore: Marshall Cavendish Editions, 2019) is a stark departure from his previous books. Indeed, this is not a collection of cartoons, but a narration of his creative process, a reflection on the impact of his cartoons, as well as a contemplation of his journey as a political cartoonist in Malaysia, particularly during the critical political era between 2009 and 2019. [see also: https://humanrightsdefenders.blog/2019/04/04/satire-as-a-weapon-malaysian-cartoonists-showed-the-way/]
Organized in a chronological manner, this book presents the development of the artist’s works on the background of the important events, issues and political crises that have influenced his creativity.. threats, intimidation and imprisonment, for himself and his assistants; arrests; the confiscation of his books; the rummaging of his office by the authorities; pressure placed on his publisher and printer; as well as the mental and physical attacks led by supporters of the previous government on his exhibitions, his works and his person.
Starting with an introductory chapter about Malaysian politics by Sukhbir Cheema, the writer, cartoonist and co-founder of Eksentrika who helped Zunar to publish this book, readers are exposed to important issues in Malaysia such as the history of government, laws related to the media and publication, such as the Printing Presses and Publication Act and the Sedition Act, self-censorship as well as the Malaysian political background as the context of Zunar’s works and its impact on freedom of speech in this country…
In the following chapters, Zunar describes his creative process in detail by focusing on the publication of several political cartoon magazines with his cartoonist friends, such as Gedung Kartun (2009); Perak Darul Kartun (2009);and Isu Dalam Kartun (2010), as well as his major books 1 Funny Malaysia (2009); Cartoon-O-Phobia (2010); Even My Pen Has A Stand! (2011); Pirates of the Carry-BN (2012); The Conspiracy to Imprison Anwar (2014); Lawak & Lawan (2012); Ini-Kartun’Lah(2013); Ros in Kangkong Land (2015); Wasabi (2016); Sapuman: Man of Steal (2015); and his most popular book to date, Ketawa Pink Pink (2018). Beforehand, he briefly mentions his previous jobs, revealing that he once worked as a construction labourer, a factory worker and a laboratory assistant in a government hospital before finding success as a political cartoonist.
……the book describes in detail how each of his cartoons and books became controversial as a result of actions taken by the authorities, who stopped their distribution and their sale, despite early titles such as Gedung Kartun (2009) having received permission to be published by the Home Ministry. His other books have received the same treatment, because his cartoons expose the corruption scandals that are rampant in the country, involving in particular former Prime Minister Najib Razak and his extravagantly rich wife Rosmah Mansor. They also touched on critical issues such as the mysterious death of opposition activist Teoh Beng Hock; Anwar Ibrahim’s imprisonment; the murder of Altantuya, and the 1MDB scandal. Zunar’s cartoons have been considered a threat to public order. They were therefore declared illegal and he was dragged to the police station, detained, sentenced in court and thrown into jail. All of this is described carefully by Zunar in this book…Just as he is detailed and systematic in his creative process, Zunar also adopts the same attitude to overcome all the threats and obstacles he and his assistants had to face as a result of his cartoons. Just as he prepared his cartoons carefully, he also prepared his strategy and faced each arrest with calm, contacting his friends in the media in order to publicize his arrests, especially through the Internet and the social media. Zunar’s case shows the importance and power of the Internet and social media to influence the new political scenario in a global world, and in this country. Zunar’s strategy can serve as a guide for any cartoonists, writers or artists facing similar threats and situations.
Zunar’s philosophy is captured in the sentence: “How can I be neutral? Even my pen has a stand”…..Zunar’s book also shows that he is not alone in his fight. His assistants, his friends, his supportive wife, his lawyers, the media, international cartoonist associations and his faithful supporters from all around the world have all contributed to Zunar’s success and played a role in his “fight through cartoons”.
For Malaysians, the figure pictured (below) is instantly recognizable as Rosmah Mansor, wife of disgraced former Prime Minister Najib Razak and — according to prosecutors in the US and Malaysia — a modern day Imelda Marcos who accrued luxury goods worth millions of dollars using money embezzled from the state investment fund, 1MDB.
A cartoon of former Malaysian first lady Rosmah Mansor by Zunar is seen in a gallery in Kuala Lumpur. Credit: James Griffiths/CNN
Zunar‘s work welcomes visitors to “Democracy in Action,” a recent exhibition that would have been impossible to stage only a year ago.
Malaysian cartoonist Zunar, poses with handcuffs prior to a book-launch event in Kuala Lumpur on February 14, 2015. Credit: MANAN VATSYAYANA/AFP/AFP/Getty Images
..Just last year, it seemed almost certain that Zunar would end up in prison. A number of his books had been banned, and while his work was still widely shared online, the artist faced multiple charges of sedition and committing acts deemed “detrimental to parliamentary democracy.” Unknown assailants attacked him at a gallery show, police seized his works and he was banned from leaving the country. Then, in a shock election result, a coalition of opposition parties turfed Najib out of office, promising to clamp down on corruption and reverse the country’s turn toward authoritarianism. Now Zunar is watching as his the political figures who were once his nemeses and muses face decades behind bars themselves — in part because artists like him helped bring attention to their alleged corruption and disdain for the rule of law. “The medium of cartooning is (a) very powerful medium,” Zunar told CNN at his small studio in a Kuala Lumpur suburb. “Everywhere, in any country you go, (cartoonists) get killed. Cartoonists, get arrested, put in jail everywhere because of the medium.“
Fellow artist Fahmi Reza, who also faced prosecution under Najib, said this is partly because of cartoons’ unique ability to poke fun at those in power. “Using satire and humor is effective because it breaks the fear barrier,” he said in a phone interview. “People had always been afraid to speak out. The culture of fear is always there; the culture of self-censorship is always there. That’s where satire and humor can be the most effective tool, it makes people less afraid.“
In June 2016, Fahmi Reza was charged with two counts of violating section 233(1) of the Communications and Multimedia Act, which forbids disseminating online content deemed to annoy, abuse, threaten or harass others. Fahmi had depicted Najib as a clown with big red lips and arched, thick eyebrows. The image quickly caught on with Malaysians sick of the widespread allegations of corruption, and it soon became a common sight at anti-government protests.
A caricature of Malaysian Prime Minister by artist Fahmi Reza. The artwork almost landed Fahmi in prison. Credit: MOHD RASFAN/AFP/AFP/Getty Images
Like Zunar, Fahmi had a record of trouble with the authorities. ….. “One sign that whatever you’re doing is effective is when the authorities and people in power react,” he added. “If they ignore it, then there’s no impact. That’s how the whole clown thing became a symbol of protest — because of the overreaction by the authorities.“
Both cartoonists’ arrests made international headlines, helping to highlight Najib’s growing authoritarianism to the outside world. Protesters also delighted in using the caricatures of Najib and Rosmah on posters and placards after it was revealed how much the artists had irritated them. As Malaysia’s opposition grew ever more determined to oust Najib — with many observers warning that 2016’s general election might be their last chance to do so — the government passed new legislation to control what people could say about it.
Activists hold up caricatures of Najib Razak and Rosmah Mansor (center). Political art became a key tool of protest in Malaysia during Najib’s rule. Credit: MOHD RASFAN/AFP/AFP/Getty Images
In early 2018, it introduced a new law to crack down on “fake news” that critics said was so broadly defined that it could easily be used to shut down and criminalize criticism of Najib.
Eventually however, the wave of dissent was too great for Najib to overcome. ….Since Najib’s downfall, charges against Zunar and Fahmi have been dropped, though the latter is still fighting to have an earlier conviction overturned. Both men said that, while they felt considerably freer under the new government, true reform has yet to be delivered.
The German NGO Wahrheitskämper (TruthFighters) and Amnesty International set up a bus stall at the International Frankfurt book fair every year to educate people about threats to freedom of expression. Different sketch artists pay tribute to courageous human rights defenders.
In 2018 the stall included portraits of Shaheed Salmaan Taseer, the late publisher of Daily Times of Pakistan, made by the German artist Steff Murschetz. Illustrator from Oberursel Christine Krahe painted the portrait of the Turkish author Ahmet Altan, who is imprisoned since 2016. Susanne Köhler, a Frankfurt based illustrator and initiator of the memorial project Wahrheitskämpfer – Fighters for Truth – drew the portrait of the Journalist Kyaw Soe Oo who is imprisoned in Myanmar. Christian Scharfenberg also made a portrait of slain US journalist John McNamara, who was killed in a mass shooting at The Capital Gazette newspaper in June 2018. Deniz Yucel was imprisoned by Turkish government in February 2017 for almost a year while serving as a correspondent for Germany’s Die WeltN24 media group in Turkey.
Artist Steff Murschetz from U-Comix-Magazin drew a sketch of Salmaan Taseer Shaheed
Speaking to Daily Times, Steff Murschetz said that Salmaan Taseer’s sketch was his way of conveying his love and respect for the visionary man who gave up his life while protecting Pakistani society from intolerance and injustice. Known German lawyer of Pakistani origin Advocate Muzaffar Chaudhry also joined the Amnesty International event and told Daily Times that the Supreme Court’s decision in Aasia Bibi’s case was a recognition of Salmaan Taseer’s clarity of vision.
Yesterday, 3 May 2018, was World Press Freedom Day and many noteworthy activities took place. The Economist and many other newspapers of course paid attention with grisly statistics from the Committee to Protect Journalists and other sources. It was also a time to award courageous journalists and cartoonist; just to mention a few:
Musa Kart was announced as the 2018 laureate of the International Press Cartoon Prize by Cartooning for Peace.
The 2018 International Press Cartoon (or Drawing) Prize, presented biannually in Geneva, was awarded to the Turkish cartoonist who was recently sentenced to almost four years in prison for “aiding terrorism”. He is a 64-year-old artist working with the Turkish daily newspaper Cumhuriyet and was described as a “free spirit and a remarkable artist” by Swiss cartoonist Chappatte, a member of the jury.
It was also the day of the presentation of the first Ari Rath Prize for Critical Journalism (established to honour journalists who have rendered outstanding services to critical reporting on immigration, expulsion and asylum, committed to respect for human rights, in the spirit of the former editor-in-chief of the Jerusalem Post, who died in January 2017). Austrian journalist Alexandra Föderl-Schmid was the laureate.
The Stockholm Center for Freedom (SCF) partnered with the London-based International Observatory of Human Rights (IOHR) to commemorate World Press Freedom Day in Stockholm with an event focused on Turkey, which leads the world in the highest number of journalists in jail. According to SCF data, 258 journalists and media workers were in jail as of today, with 59 of them already convicted on dubious charges of terrorism, defamation and coup plotting. In addition, 142 Turkish journalists who were forced to go into exile or still remain at large in Turkey are wanted for arrest by authorities.
Nine NGOs wrote on World Press Freedom Day a joint letter expressing deep concern over the continued arbitrary detention of Tashi Wangchuk, a Tibetan language advocate arrested in 2016 after giving an interview to the New York Times. Tashi Wangchuk has since been tried for “inciting separatism,” a politically motivated charge that violates his rights to freedom of expression and association. [Tashi Wangchuk began raising public concern for the lack of rightful Tibetan-language education …In late 2015, he spoke with the New York Times in an interview about his attempts to promote the teaching of Tibetan; he insisted the interview be on the record. A journalist from the New York Times also accompanied him to Beijing, where Tashi Wangchuk attempted to file a lawsuit to ensure local authorities guarantee the provision of Tibetan language education. The result was an article and video documentary featured in the New York Times in November 2015.
In his article, Tashi Wangchuk insisted that his language advocacy was peaceful and non-political. His attempts to persuade the Chinese government to guarantee Tibetan language instruction were conducted through official channels and he made it clear that he was not advocating Tibetan independence. Instead, his main focus was ending the destruction of Tibetan language and culture. Despite taking these precautions, Tashi Wangchuk was arrested on 27 January 2016, held in an unknown location and later stood trial in a closed session. See also:
And then there were many smaller events all around the globe that also deserves attention, such as Amnesty International Nepal voicing support to journalists as human rights defenders (such as Charan Kumar Prasai and Subodh Pyakurel and Rajan Prasad Kuikel).
Hans Thoolen on Human Rights Defenders and their awards 