Published on 14 July 2009
24 February 2010 - Radio reporter held by Al-Shabaab militia for past three days
4 December 2009 - Toll of journalists killed in suicide bombing increases to three
25 November 2009 - Two foreign journalists released after 15 months as hostages
Reporters Without Borders is shocked that the two French government security advisers who were abducted in Mogadishu this morning had been posing as journalists. Gunmen kidnapped them from the Sahafi Hotel, located in the safest part of the capital. No group has so far claimed responsibility for their abduction.
“Being a journalist is not a cover, it is a profession,” Reporters Without Borders said. “We hope these two advisers are freed quickly but we are shocked that they were passing themselves off as journalists. They were on an official mission and had no need of cover. Their behaviour endangers journalists in a region where media personnel are already in danger.”
The two advisers, who had only recently arrived in Mogadishu, had been sent by the French government’s General Directorate for External Security (DGSE) to provide security advice to the transitional government headed by President Sheikh Sharif Ahmed.
Africa’s deadliest country for the news media, Somalia was ranked 153rd out of 173 countries in the 2008 Reporters Without Borders press freedom index. Kidnappings of journalists and humanitarian aid workers are now common in Somalia.
Canadian reporter Amanda Lindhout and Australian photographer Nigel Brennan are still being held hostage since they were kidnapped near Mogadishu on 23 August 2008. Five journalists have been killed in Somalia since the start of the year.
In September 2001, the Eritrean government ordered that all of the country’s privately owned publications be closed down. In the days that followed, police arrested above fifteen or so journalists and took them to Asmara’s police station No.
