Reporters without Borders: Prominent journalists released from prison in 2024
In many parts of the world, members of the press risk imprisonment for doing their work. In 2024 however a number of prominent journalists were released. The non-profit organization Reporters without Borders (RSF) sees this as a positive sign, despite new challenges to come in 2025: these cases show that fighting for press freedom pays off.
In January 2024 the Iranian journalists Niloofar Hamedi and Elaheh Mohammadi were released on bail. They had been among the first to report on the death of Mahsa Amini in the fall of 2022. Amini, a young Kurdish woman, died in custody after being arrested by the morality police – an event that set off massive protests against the Iranian government.
As a result of their work, the reporters were sentenced in October 2023 to more than ten years in prison. Speaking to Posteo at the time, RSF called the sentences “scandalous” – they showed how “vindictive the regime in Tehran” could be.
When the women were released in January, they had already spent several months in detention. A court had since reduced their sentences. But in October 2024 the Iranian judiciary declared its intention to force both women to serve out their remaining five-year sentences. According to RSF, since the beginning of the Woman, Life, Freedom movement, more than 100 journalists have been arrested in Iran; 18 of them are currently still in prison.
RSF reports that in March the Congolese journalist Stanis Bujakera was freed after six months in detention. The correspondent for the news magazine Jeune Afrique had been accused of “forging and disseminating” an allegedly false document. In convicting Bujakera, the authorities in the Democratic Republic of the Congo had tried to force him to reveal his journalistic sources. Human Rights Watch called his case politically motivated. After his release he urged Congolese journalists “not to give in to any pressure.”
In May, after nearly six years in prison, the Indian journalist Aasif Sultan was released on bail. Sultan, a journalist for the monthly Kashmir Narrator, works in the union territory of Jabbu and Kashmir – he had been accused of membership in a separatist group. RSF reports that colleagues and family members have disputed these accusations and suspect that he was arrested in response to his critical reporting. RSF criticizes the Indian authorities’ use of anti-terrorism laws to systematically harass independent journalists in the region – Aasif Sultan’s case is one example of this harassment.
Judicial tug of war
The release of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange in June garnered global attention. Assange’s release ended a judicial tug of war that had gone on for 14 years.
The US Justice Department had accused the Australian citizen of conspiring with whistleblower Chelsea Manning to steal and publish classified military documents in 2010. The US claimed that publication of the documents endangered national security. Assange had been imprisoned in the Belmarsh high-security prison in the UK for years while the US pressed for his extradition. British courts repeatedly denied US requests.
In the end Assange made a deal with the US and admitted to a charge of “conspiring to unlawfully obtain and disseminate classified national defense information.” He then went home to Australia.
Prisoner exchange
The release of Alsu Kurmasheva and Evan Gershkovich in August likewise drew substantial attention: The Russian-American journalist Kurmasheva and the American journalist Gershkovich were released from prison as part of a major prisoner exchange between Russia and several countries, including the US.
Gershkovich was arrested by Russian security forces in March 2023 and accused of espionage. The correspondent for the Wall Street Journal was subsequently sentenced to 16 years in prison.
Kurmasheva works for the US-funded international media organization Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty and was sentenced to six and a half years in prison for allegedly spreading “false information” about the army.
In Burundi in August the radio host Floriane Irangabiye was pardoned and freed. She had been sentenced in January 2023 to ten years in prison for “endangering the integrity of the national territory.” According to RSF, Irangabiye was convicted on “trumped-up charges” relating to her broadcasts from neighboring Rwanda, which were often critical of the Burundian authorities.
Appeal in Guatemala
Finally, in October, José Rubén Zamora in Guatemala and Ihsane El Kadi in Algeria were released from prison.
José Rubén Zamora is the founder and publisher of the newspaper elPeriódico, which according to RSF spent two decades uncovering political corruption in Guatemala – before being forced to close in May 2023. In July 2022 Zamora was arrested on spurious charges of money laundering. He was sentenced to six years in prison after spending almost a year in pre-trial detention.
In October he was provisionally released to house arrest. Just a month later, however, this decision was revoked – a move criticized even by Guatemalan president Bernardo Arévalo. Zamora’s appeal is currently before Guatemala’s Supreme Court.
Ihsane El Kadi was freed after receiving a pardon from Algeria’s president. The director of Radio M and the news site Maghreb Émergent was accused of supporting organizations that threatened the government and security of Algeria. Despite his release, El Kadi was made to pay steep fines and his assets were confiscated. According to RSF, Radio M was forced to shut down in June.
Many journalists remain in prison
According to statistics collected by RSF, at the close of 2024 at least 550 journalists around the world were in prison because of their work – an increase of 7 percent compared to the previous year. China and Hong Kong had the largest number of imprisoned journalists (124).
Among them is the citizen journalist Zhang Zhan, who came to prominence through her reporting from the city of Wuhan at the start of the Covid-19 pandemic. She was arrested in May 2020 and later that year was sentenced to four years in prison. In May 2024 she was released – but then arrested again in August. According to Amnesty International she has been charged with “picking quarrels and provoking trouble.” This charge is often used as a pretense for arresting critics in China, according to RSF. Zhang Zhan now faces an additional five years in prison.
RSF expects 2025 to bring immense challenges for press freedom – but in highlighting these cases of journalists who were freed last year, the organization means to show that fighting for freedom of the press pays off. (js)