Reporters Without Borders participated in the demonstrations that were staged outside Burma’s embassies in several capitals today [9 Sept] in response to a call from Democratic Voice of Burma (DVB), a radio and TV station run by Burmese exile journalists.

Reporters Without Borders is dismayed to learn that a UN-backed special tribunal that is trying former Khmer Rouge leaders for war crimes has started contempt of court proceedings against Voice of America’s Khmer-language service for allegedly revealing confidential information about a new case against the Khmer Rouge.

Reporters Without Borders condemns the continuing detention of the journalist Somyot Prueksakasemsuk, who was held for more than the 84 days allowed under the criminal code before being formally charged on 26 July on two lèse-majesté counts. No date has been set for his trial, at which he could get a combined sentence of up to 30 years in prison.

Press freedom and online freedom of information are still being flouted in Burma, three months after Thein Sein’s election as a civilian president. He promised to “respect the role of the media” but heavy jail sentences for journalists, suspension of newspapers and police raids on Internet cafés show that there has been no let-up in controls and intimidation. And now a string of new measures have just tightened control over Internet use.

Middle East: predators of press freedom start to topple The kingpins of repressive machinery, political leaders of regimes hostile to civil liberties and direct organizers of campaigns of violence against journalists – they are the predators of press freedom. They prey on the media. See all the predators (http://en.rsf.org/predators,21.html)