Freedom of the Press

Niger’s military government has banned many local and foreign reporters since seizing power in 2023.

Media watchdog Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has condemned Niger’s suspension of nine French media publications as the military government continues to crack down on journalists.

Niger announced the suspension on Friday, citing “repeated dissemination of content likely to seriously jeopardise public order, national unity, social cohesion, and the stability of the institutions of the Republic”.

The suspended organisations are France 24, RFI (Radio France Internationale), France Afrique Media, LSI Africa, AFP (Agence France-Presse), TV5 Monde, TF1 Info, Jeune Afrique and Mediapart, according to a TV statement from the National Communication Observatory (ONC).

It added that the decision was “immediate” and it included “satellite packages, cable networks, digital platforms, websites and mobile applications”.

RSF described the decision as “abusive”.

“RSF condemns a coordinated strategy to repress press freedom within the AES [Alliance of Sahel States] and calls for the immediate reversal of this abusive decision,” said a statement posted on X, referring to Niger and allies Mali and Burkina Faso, all ruled by military governments.

Niger’s military seized power in July 2023, toppling the democratically elected government of President Mohamed Bazoum and detaining him.

The government has since targeted local and foreign media outlets, particularly those critical of its policies, by issuing bans or suspensions.

RFI and France 24 were suspended a few days after the coup, and the BBC from Britain was suspended in December 2024.

The targeting of French and other foreign media comes as Niger’s military government has largely severed ties with its former colonial power, France, and turned away from Western allies.

In late 2023, Niger asked leaders in Paris to withdraw thousands of troops involved in missions against armed groups operating in Niger, neighbouring Mali and Burkina Faso.

The three AES states have since secured defence partnerships with other countries, notably Russia.

All three have regularly denounced France’s “imperialism”, saying they want to assert their “sovereignty”. French media and other foreign outlets have similarly been suspended or banned by the governments in Bamako and Ouagadougou.

Local journalists have also been affected. Two Nigerien journalists, Gazali Abdou, a correspondent for German broadcaster Deutsche Welle, and Hassane Zada, a regional newspaper editor, were released this week after being detained for months.

In 2024, leaders in the capital Niamey strengthened a law that criminalises the digital dissemination of “data likely to disturb public order”.

The United Nations said in November that 13 journalists were arrested in Niger and urged the government to release them. Local media organisations say six journalists are detained for allegedly “undermining national defence” and for “conspiracy against the authority of the state”.

According to AFP, Niger suspended nearly 3,000 local and foreign NGOs in 2025, accusing them of lacking transparency and supporting “terrorists” and armed groups.

Niger dropped 37 places in this year’s RSF World Press Freedom Index and now ranks 120th out of 180 countries. RSF and Amnesty International have repeatedly voiced concerns about the “decline” in press freedom in Niger.

The pope urged the rememberance of journalists who lost their lives pursuing the truth, particularly in conflict areas.

Pope Leo has marked World Press Freedom Day ⁠by condemning ⁠violations of media freedom around the world and paying tribute to journalists killed while reporting in ⁠conflict zones.

At the end of his weekly Sunday prayer in a sunny Saint Peter’s Square at the Vatican, the pontiff ⁠said the day highlighted both the importance of independent journalism and the growing threats faced by reporters.

“Today we celebrate World Press Freedom Day … unfortunately, this right is often violated, sometimes in blatant ‌ways, sometimes in more hidden forms,” he said.

World Press Freedom Day, ⁠sponsored by the UN cultural agency UNESCO is intended to show support for media organisations that come under ⁠pressure or censorship. It is also an opportunity to commemorate journalists who have been killed at work.

The Roman Catholic leader urged the faithful to remember journalists and reporters who have lost their lives pursuing the truth, particularly in conflict areas.

“We remember the many journalists and reporters who have been victims of war and violence,” ⁠the pope said.

A report last month by the Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs’ Costs of War project found that Israel’s war on Gaza was the deadliest conflict for media workers ever recorded, with Israeli forces having killed 232 Palestinian journalists since October 2023.

More journalists have been killed in Gaza than in both world wars, the Vietnam War, the wars in Yugoslavia, and the United States war in Afghanistan combined, the report found.

In past speeches, the ⁠leader of the Catholic Church has described journalism as a pillar of society and democracy, and information as a public good that must be safeguarded ‌and defended.

The pontiff has often thanked reporters for sharing the truth, saying that doing their job could never be ‌considered ‌a crime, and frequently calling for the release of journalists who have been unfairly detained or prosecuted.

Last week, the leading Paris-based press freedom NGO, Reporters Sans Frontières (RSF), or Reporters Without Borders, found that freedom of the press around the world has fallen to its lowest level in a quarter of a century.

For the first time since RSF started producing the index in 2002, it said more than half of the world’s countries fall into the “difficult” or “very serious” categories for press freedom – “a clear sign that journalism is increasingly criminalised worldwide”.

The United States has fallen to a “historic low” in the Reporters Sans Frontieres (RSF), or Reporters Without Borders, annual press freedom tracker, continuing a decade-long decline, the organisation has said.

The report on Thursday recorded a global drop in press freedom indicators in 2025, with, for the first time, more than half of the world’s countries labelled as “difficult” or “very serious”.

While the US, during the first year of US President Donald Trump’s second term, remained in the “problematic” category, it dropped seven spaces from 57th in the world to 64th. Norway led the list, with Eritrea ranked lowest among 180 countries.

In a statement, Clayton Weimers, executive director of RSF’s North America office, said the US was experiencing a “press freedom crisis”.

“Trump and his administration have carried out a coordinated war on press freedom since the day he took office, and we will live with the consequences for years to come,” he said in a statement.

“Our message is clear: Protect legal rights, ensure accountability for attacks on media professionals, and support independent media to restore American press freedom.”

The report pointed to both Trump administration policies and the wider consolidation of media companies in the US, which critics say opens the door to stifling certain points of view.

That has included Skydance Media’s acquisition of Paramount Global, which includes CBS News. Skydance is owned by David Ellison, whose father, Larry Ellison, is a confidant of Trump’s.

Paramount Skydance is also currently acquiring Warner Bros, which owns CNN.

All told, just six companies control most US media: Comcast, Walt Disney, Warner Bros Discovery, Paramount Skydance, Sony, and Amazon.

While Trump has long had an adversarial relationship with journalists, press freedom observers say the head of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has accelerated pressure on media figures and journalists during the president’s second term.

In March, FCC chair Brendan Carr said he would revoke the licences of broadcasters that are “running hoaxes and news distortions”, and that do not “operate in the public interest” in their reporting on the US-Israel war with Iran. Trump said he was “thrilled” by Carr’s statements.

Carr has also threatened to revoke the licenses of broadcasters for their coverage of Trump’s immigration policies, which critics say can have a chilling effect on local news organisations.

The effort has extended to television talk show hosts, who have been threatened by the FCC over jokes.

Most recently, Carr announced an investigation into several ABC channels.

That came days after the network’s flagship late-night host, Jimmy Kimmel, made a joke about the White House Correspondents Dinner (WHCD).

Kimmel had quipped that First Lady Melania Trump had the “glow of an expectant widow” before the event.

Days later, a gunman attempted to storm the WHCD in Washington, DC, which Trump was attending for the first time. The Trumps later connected Kimmel’s joke to the attack, calling for Kimmel’s firing.

Kimmel has said the joke was about the 79-year-old president and the 56-year-old first lady’s “age difference” and not a call for violence.

Critics of the FCC’s move included Republican Senator Ted Cruz, who said he does “not believe the FCC should operate as the speech police”.

The White House has repeatedly called Trump the most “transparent” president in US history, pointing to his regular news conferences.

Freedom of the press around the world has fallen to its lowest level in a quarter of a century, according to the leading Paris-based press freedom NGO, Reporters Sans Frontieres (RSF), or Reporters Without Borders.

Every year, RSF publishes a World Press Freedom Index used to compare the level of freedom enjoyed by journalists and media outlets in 180 countries. Its ranking uses a five-point scale to assess a country’s level of press freedom, ranging from “very serious” to “good”.

For the first time since RSF started producing the index in 2002, more than half of the world’s countries fall into the “difficult” or “very serious” categories for press freedom – “a clear sign that journalism is increasingly criminalised worldwide”.

Only seven mostly Nordic countries are ranked with “good” press freedom, with Norway, the Netherlands and Estonia in the top three. France ranks 25th with a “satisfactory” score, while the United States ranks 64th with a “problematic” score, falling seven places since President Donald Trump took office.

RSF reports that Trump “has turned his repeated attacks on the press and journalists into a systematic policy”, citing the detention of Salvadoran journalist Mario Guevara, who was later deported, while he was documenting a protest against immigration raids, as well as the suspension of several notable public media institutions.

In Latin America, RSF highlighted the dramatic fall of Javier Milei’s Argentina (98th, -11) and of El Salvador (143rd), which has dropped 105 places since 2014 following the launch of a war against the Maras criminal gangs.

The press freedom NGO said that “Eastern Europe and the Middle East are the two most dangerous regions for journalists in the world, as they have been for 25 years”, notably putting Russia (172nd) and Iran (177th) in the bottom 10.

It added that wars and restrictions on access to information are some of the driving factors for the decline in press freedom. It cited Israel’s attacks on journalists in Gaza, the occupied West Bank and Lebanon as an example of this, ranking Israel 116th.

“Since October 2023, more than 220 journalists have been killed in Gaza by the Israeli army, including at least 70 who were slain while carrying out their work,” it said.

Broadly speaking, RSF reported that “the criminalisation of journalism, which is rooted in circumventing press law and misusing emergency legislation and common law, is proving to be a global phenomenon”.

It reported that more than 60 percent of countries – 110 out of 180 – have criminalised media workers in various ways, notably citing India (157th), Egypt (169th), Georgia (135th), Turkiye (163rd) and Hong Kong (140th) as prime examples of state-imposed crackdowns.

“Although attacks on the right to information are more diverse and sophisticated, their perpetrators are now operating in plain sight,” Anne Bocande, RSF’s Editorial Director said.

She cited “authoritarian states, complicit or incompetent political powers, predatory economic actors and under-regulated online platforms” as the main causes “for the global decline in press freedom”.

Bocande called on democratic governments and citizens to do more to end this global criminalisation of journalists, particularly through “firm guarantees and meaningful sanctions”.

“Current protection mechanisms are not strong enough; international law is being undermined and impunity is rife,” she said. “Inaction is a form of endorsement,” while concluding that “the spread of authoritarianism isn’t inevitable”.

President Alexandr Lukashenko is hoping to improve relations with the West once more.

Belarus has released Polish-Belarusian journalist Andrzej Poczobut from jail as part of a prisoner exchange.

Poland’s Prime Minister Donald Tusk confirmed the release on Tuesday, noting that Warsaw had been helped in a joint diplomatic push on Minsk by the United States, Romania and Moldova.

The prisoner swap with Poland saw 10 prisoners released overall, with signs that Belarusian President Alexandr Lukashenko is hoping to improve relations with the West once more. Ties have deteriorated due to his support for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Poczobut was detained by Belarusian authorities in 2021 and later sentenced to eight years in a labour camp after a trial widely criticised by rights groups and Western governments as politically motivated.

Concerns had grown in recent years about his health while in detention.

“Andrzej Poczobut is free! Welcome to your Polish home, my friend,” Tusk posted on social media.

Belarus also ⁠released Polish priest ⁠Grzegorz Gawel and a Belarusian who helped Polish ‌services, whose name was not to be revealed, ⁠the Polish leader added.

‌Russians and Moldovans were also among the prisoners swapped in a “five ⁠for ⁠five” exchange.

Joint-effort

Tusk also noted that the release followed lengthy diplomatic efforts.

“The exchange at the Polish-Belarusian border is the finale of a two-year-long intricate diplomatic game, full of dramatic twists,” he said.

“It succeeded thanks to the outstanding work of our services, diplomats and prosecutors, as well as the tremendous help from our American, Romanian and Moldovan friends.”

The announcement came hours after Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski published a photograph of a meeting with US Special Envoy to Belarus John Coale, saying the pair had discussed “important issues”.

Coale later said that the US had helped to secure the release of three Polish nationals and two Moldovans.

“We thank Poland, Moldova, and Romania for their invaluable support in this effort, as well as President Lukashenko’s willingness to pursue constructive engagement with the United States,” he said.

“Under President Trump, America shows up for its allies and delivers diplomatic victories no one else can,” he claimed.

Poczobut, who had worked as a correspondent for the Polish newspaper Gazeta Wyborcza, has been arrested numerous times in Belarus over the past decade.

In 2011, he was fined and jailed for 15 days for his participation in protests following Belarus’s 2010 presidential election. He was later detained again in 2011 and 2012 on accusations of insulting Lukashenko.

His cases drew international condemnation, with the European Parliament, Reporters Without Borders and Amnesty International among organisations calling for his release.

Earlier this year, the European Parliament awarded Poczobut and Georgian journalist Mzia Amaglobeli the Sakharov Prize.

Washington, DC – Donald Trump — whose political career has been built, in part, on deriding the United States press — is set to attend his first White House Correspondents’ Dinner as president.

Saturday’s event continues a decades-long tradition, dating back to 1921. Still, the black-tie gala held in Washington, DC, remains a divisive event.

For years, detractors have argued its chummy approach to the presidency risks blurring the independence of the press corps.

Trump himself is one of the dinner’s critics. Until this year, Trump had refused to attend, appearing poised to defy a tradition of sitting presidents dining at least once with the press corps during the annual event.

Since he launched his first presidential campaign, Trump has taken a bellicose approach towards the media, issuing both personal attacks on journalists and lawsuits against news organisations for coverage he deems unfair.

His presence at Saturday’s dinner has only heightened questions about the event’s role in the modern era.

Trump has previously declined five previous invitations to attend, across his first and second terms. His inaugural visit on Saturday has been accompanied by changes to the dinner’s format: Most notably, the longstanding practice of having a comedian perform has been nixed.

Journalist organisations and rights groups, meanwhile, have called on the event’s host, the White House Correspondents’ Association (WHCA), to send a “forthright message” to the president about protecting the freedom of the press.

“We also urge the WHCA to reaffirm, without equivocation, that freedom of the press is not a partisan issue,” a coalition of groups, including the Society of Professional Journalists, wrote in an open letter.

A return for Trump?

Saturday is set to be the first time Trump attends the correspondents’ dinner as president, but it is not his first time attending the event.

He was present as a private citizen at the 2011 dinner, years before launching his first successful presidential campaign.

At the time, Trump had begun his foray into national politics, pushing the so-called “birtherism” theory: the racist claim that then-President Barack Obama was born in Kenya and had faked his US birth certificate.

It is tradition for the sitting president to speak at the event, and Obama seized the moment to lob barbs at Trump’s conspiracy theories and his nascent political career.

In one instance, Obama poked fun at Trump’s work hosting the reality television show The Apprentice.

Referring to Trump’s “firing” of actor Gary Busey, Obama mockingly praised his decision-making. “These are the kind of decisions that would keep me up at night,” he quipped. “Well played, sir.”

Obama also envisioned what a future Trump presidency would look like, displaying a mock-up of a “Trump White House Resort and Casino”.

Comedian Seth Meyers, who hosted the night’s event, also took aim at Trump’s birtherism claims and political ambitions.

“Donald Trump has been saying that he will run for president as a Republican,” he quipped at one point, “which is surprising since I just assumed he was running as a joke.”

Trump sat stone-faced in the audience, with several confidants later crediting the night as a major motivator for his 2016 presidential bid.

The White House Correspondents’ Association was launched in 1914, as a response to threats by then-President Woodrow Wilson to do away with presidential news conferences. The organisation has worked to expand White House access for reporters.

Comedians became mainstays of the annual dinner in the early 1980s, with both presidents and journalists often the subject of their pointed jokes.

Defenders of the event have argued that the presence of comedians helps to celebrate free speech and ground the black-tie proceedings, underscoring that no attendee is above ridicule.

But since President Trump first declined to attend the event after taking office in 2017, that norm has shifted.

Michelle Wolf’s no-holds-barred performance in 2018 is often seen as a breaking point.

In her jokes, she seized upon Trump’s past statements appearing to praise sexual assault, and she charged that Trump did not have a “big enough spine to attend” the event. She also mocked the mainstream media’s coverage of the president.

While praised by fellow comedians and some members of the press, her performance divided the White House press corps. Trump and his top officials took particular issue with the material, with the president decrying Wolf as “filthy”.

The following year, the association instead invited historian Ron Chernow to speak at the event. The dinner did not have another comedian until 2022, during the administration of US President Joe Biden.

Last year, during Trump’s first term back in office, the association abruptly cancelled a planned performance by comedian Amber Ruffin, with the board’s then-President Eugene Daniels saying it wanted to avoid “politics of division”.

This year, a mentalist, Oz Pearlman, is set to perform instead of a comedian.

Calls for press freedom

The Society of Professional Journalists, Freedom of the Press Foundation, and The National Association of Black Journalists are among the organisations and hundreds of individual journalists urging their colleagues to use the event to make a statement.

In an open letter, it said the actions by the Trump administration “represent the most systematic and comprehensive assault on freedom of the press by a sitting American president”.

The organisation pointed to a series of hostile actions the Trump administration has taken against journalists.

They include limiting the White House and Pentagon press pools, threats by the Federal Communications Commission against broadcasters, immigration enforcement actions against non-citizen journalists, and an FBI raid of a Washington Post reporter’s home.

The letter also pointed to the White House’s launching of a “hall of shame” page on its website, which highlights news organisations accused of biased coverage, as well as Trump’s repeated verbal attacks on reporters.

But the Trump administration has rejected allegations that it treats journalists unfairly or that it has prevented public access to information.

White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt, for example, has regularly touted Trump as the “most transparent” president in US history, pointing to his regular media events.

During his second term, Trump has also taken spur-of-the-moment phone interviews from reporters, even amid the US-Israeli war in Iran.

In their letter, the journalists and professional organisations note that some attendees on Saturday plan to wear pocket handkerchiefs or lapel pins with the words “First Amendment”.

The pins reference the section of the US Constitution that protects freedom of speech and freedom of the press.

But the journalists called on the White House Correspondents’ Association to go further and make it clear that it will not “normalise” Trump’s behaviour — “but instead fight back against any officeholder who has waged systematic war against the journalists whose work the dinner celebrates”.

Press freedom advocates have warned of hostile rhetoric towards journalists and increasingly restrictive policies under Milei.

The administration of Argentina’s Javier Milei has restricted access to the presidential palace, the Casa Rosada, as part of an escalating feud with the country’s journalists.

Accredited journalists reportedly arrived at the Casa Rosada on Thursday and attempted to enter the building through fingerprint scanning, as they usually would.

But they were unable to pass the scan. As confusion hit the news corps, the head of Argentina’s Secretariat of Communication and Press issued a clarification that their press accreditation had not been revoked.

“The decision to remove the fingerprints of journalists accredited to the Casa Rosada was taken as a preventive measure in response to a complaint filed by the Military Household regarding illegal espionage,” Secretary Javier Lanari wrote on social media.

“The sole objective is to guarantee national security.”

Lanari’s post cites an incident wherein two journalists from the Argentinian channel TN were accused of secretly filming inside the government palace.

After their report was broadcast, the Milei administration accused the journalists of endangering government security by showing parts of the Casa Rosada that were reportedly off limits.

On Wednesday, Milei himself took to social media to call the journalists “repugnant trash”. He then challenged other members of the news media to justify their actions.

“I would love to see that filthy scum — the 95% who carry press credentials — come out and defend what these two criminals did,” Milei wrote on X.

Since then, the president has repeatedly reposted messages critical of the news media, often accompanied by the acronym “NOLSALP” or “NOL$ALP”. It stands for: “We don’t hate journalists enough.”

“Someday, that filthy journalistic scum (95%) will have to understand that they are not above the law. They abused legal precedent. It does not come without a price,” Milei added in one of his posts on Thursday, as he continued to slam the news media.

This week’s actions are the latest in a series of policy changes under Milei designed to tighten restrictions on journalists.

Last year, for instance, his government capped entry to certain rooms in the Casa Rosada and placed other areas out of bounds.

Critics say the policies are part of a wider broadside against journalism in Argentina. The media advocacy group Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has said that, since Milei took office in 2023, the country has seen “a sharp decline in press freedom”.

And PEN International, an organisation for writers, warned last year of a “serious deterioration” in free-speech rights.

It pointed to legislation that further restricted which government documents could be made public and to Milei’s dismantling of public media, as well as the installation of a “mute” button to silence journalists during news conferences.

Already, the decision to bar journalists from entry into the Casa Rosada has faced pushback, including from Argentinian lawmakers.

Marcela Pagano, a former journalist turned deputy in Argentina’s legislature, announced on Thursday that she had filed a criminal complaint against Milei.

“The Casa Rosada is not private property,” Pagano wrote in a statement.

“Still less does a head of state — or his henchmen officials — have the authority to decide whether the press may access the building.”

She called Thursday’s incident “an unprecedented occurrence since the return of democracy” in Argentina in 1983.

“Prohibiting journalists from exercising their freedom of expression is the first step toward silencing any dissenting voice — a situation that we in Argentina have experienced during our country’s darkest moments,” she added. “THEY WILL NOT SILENCE US.”

Dozens of mourners, journalists and family attended the funeral of Amal Khalil, a Lebanese journalist who was killed in an Israeli attack in south Lebanon. Heidi Pett breaks down what we know about the incident, and Khalil’s last message to her family.

Raid is part of Moscow’s hardline social conservatism and clampdown on political life.

Russian police have raided the country’s top publishing house on suspicion that it has been disseminating “homosexual propaganda”, local media report.

Police reportedly seized thousands of books on Tuesday and took Yevgeny Kapiev, the chief executive of Eksmo, in for questioning. The raid appears to be part of Moscow’s pivot to hardline social conservatism with repressive laws running alongside a clampdown on political life and aggressive foreign policy.

Police targeted Kapiev as part of a “criminal case on extremism” over the publication of books “dealing with LGBT themes”, Eksmo communications director Yekaterina Kozhanova told the AFP news agency.

The firm’s finance director, head of distribution and deputy commercial director were also interrogated, Kozhanova said.

Eksmo is suspected of unofficially marketing books, including novels, that promote “gay propaganda” to Russian youth, the broadcaster Ren-TV reported.

An investigation into Eksmo was opened last year when authorities said “LGBT propaganda” had been “detected” in books published by its Popcorn Books subsidiary and they arrested several members of its staff.

Ultraconservative turn

Books showing approval of same-sex relations have been banned in Russia for more than 10 years.

The law has been tightened recently, requiring publishers to remove publications and destroy entire editions if they depict same-sex relationships.

The persecution of LGBTQ individuals, organisations and communities has intensified in the past decade or so as the Kremlin heralds “traditional values”. That drive has included a crackdown on films, books, art and culture, among other areas of social life.

Cultural producers have faced significant pressure even when they focus on giants of Russian culture. Biographies of Mikhail Bulgakov, author of The Master and Margarita, and the poet, actor and singer Vladimir Vysotsky have to be marked with warning labels because they are seen as promoting drug-taking.

The ultraconservative social turn has accelerated since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

In 2023, Russia’s Supreme Court ruled that LGBTQ activists should be designated as “extremists” and banned activities of the “international LGBTQ movement”.

Courts have issued fines and jail sentences to people displaying LGBTQ “symbols”, such as clothes, jewellery or posters featuring the rainbow flag.

Out of 49 European countries, the Rainbow Europe organisation ranked Russia third from bottom in terms of tolerance of LGBTQ people.