CPJ honors Ethiopia’s Zone 9 Bloggers
By Tesfa-Alem Tekle
November 25, 2015 (ADDIS ABABA) – A press freedom advocacy group has honored Ethiopia’s ‘Zone 9’ bloggers with the 2015 International Press Freedom Awards for their “courageous work amid risks such as physical attack, imprisonment, exile, and murder”
“These awardees go forward with their work in the face of threats from repressive governments, drug cartels, Islamic State, and other terrorists and thugs determined to stifle the truth,” said Joel Simon, CPJ’s executive director in a statement extended to Sudan Tribune.
“In recognising these fearless journalists, we send a message of support to journalists everywhere-and a message to authoritarian actors that we are watching”
All the nine members of Ethiopia’s Zone-9 group were detained in April 2014 over accusations of plotting to incite violence, planning to carry out attacks in collaboration with banned opposition groups including with the US based, Ginbot 7, long designated as terrorist entity by the Ethiopian government.
Last month, four bloggers of the group were cleared of terrorism charges after 539 days in detention.
Terror charges against other five members of the Zone 9 collective were dropped and were released in July, few weeks before the historic visit of US president Barack Obama.
The Zone 9 bloggers are known of their strong criticism to the Ethiopian government.
The New York Times has called the Zone 9 bloggers collective as “one of the world’s most widely followed press-freedom cases”
Established in 2012, the Zone 9 group calls itself as “an informal group of young Ethiopian bloggers working together to create an alternative independent narration of the socio-political conditions in Ethiopia”
The name ‘Zone 9’ was taken after one of the jail zones in Kality, Ethiopia’s notorious state prison where most political prisoners, including several critical journalists are held.
International right groups had long accused the horn of Africa’s nation of using the 2009 introduced broadly defined anti-terrorism law as a tool to stifle freedom of expression.
In an unprecedented move, Ethiopia has freed several journalists from prison this year however right groups such as Amnesty International say that the release or acquittal of journalists should not be taken as victory for freedom of expression in Ethiopia.
In an interview with BBC, Ethiopian prime minster Hailemariam Desalegn Earlier this month argued that the journalists including Zone 9 were not arrested in connection with their profession but because evidence was found that they had links with outlawed opposition movements who try to destabilize the country.
“This has to be very clearly underlined because that shouldn’t be confused with the noble profession, journalism and the work that journalists do in this country”
The premier further said his government is ready to embrace critical views from journalists. He, however, admitted poor performances exist within his administration.
“We are ready to be criticized by any journalists because we know we are not perfect” he said adding the diversity of the country meant that democracy and human rights were central to its survival and success.
Ethiopia is ranked 142nd out of 180 countries in the 2015 Reporters Without Borders press freedom index. According to CPJ’s recent research, Ethiopia is the second-worst jailer of journalists in Africa after its neighbor Eritrea.
(ST)