(CEHURDES/IFEX) – Communist Party of Nepal (CPN-Maoist) rebels recently issued death threats to nine journalists, including Harihar Singh Rathor and Bed Prakash Timsina of Kantipur Publications, in the far western district of Dailekh. The journalists were threatened for failing to support the CPN-Maoists’s movement. The message was conveyed through journalist Dakendra Raj Thapa’s family members. […]
(CEHURDES/IFEX) – Communist Party of Nepal (CPN-Maoist) rebels recently issued death threats to nine journalists, including Harihar Singh Rathor and Bed Prakash Timsina of Kantipur Publications, in the far western district of Dailekh. The journalists were threatened for failing to support the CPN-Maoists’s movement.
The message was conveyed through journalist Dakendra Raj Thapa’s family members. Thapa was brutally murdered on 11 August 2004 for allegedly spying on the rebels’ activities and working as an informer for the security forces. According to “The Kathmandu Post” daily, “it was the verdict of [the rebels’] ‘people’s court’ to eliminate the local journalists.”
CEHURDES condemns the death threats against the journalists and urges the CPN-Maoist leaders to end all attacks on journalists and free expression activists. The organisation further urges respect for press freedom, freedom of expression and civil liberties. It asks international human rights and press freedom organisations to put pressure on the CPN-Maoist rebels to halt their actions against journalists and free expression activists.
