In record year, China, Israel, and Myanmar are world’s leading jailers of journalists - Committee to Protect Journalists 1/24/25, 10:29 AM persecuted Pamiri minority. One, Ulfatkhonim Mamadshoeva, is serving 20 years after authorities accused her of organizing Pamiri protests in the country’s eastern Gorno-Badakhshan autonomous region. At least 10 Kurdish journalists, the Middle East’s fourth-largest ethnic group, are also in prison: #ve in Turkey, two in Iran, and three in Iraq. Russian occupiers have targeted the Crimean Tatar community in Ukraine’s Crimea. In Afghanistan, the Taliban detained reporter Mahdi Ansary, a member of Afghanistan’s persecuted Hazara community, in October 2024. Harsh sentences Many of the journalists in CPJ’s 2024 census have been sentenced to spend signi#cant parts of their lives in jail. Ten have been sentenced to life; one has been sentenced to death. A total of 54 are serving more than 10 years; 55 between #ve and 10 years, and 62 between one and #ve years. Many of the journalists in CPJ’s 2024 census have been sentenced to spend signi!cant parts of their lives in jail. In Senegal, a CPJ investigation found that René Capain Bassène was jailed for life for a crime that witnesses said he couldn’t have committed. In Myanmar, Shin Daewe – denied legal representation during her trial by a secret military tribunal – received a life sentence in 2024 on charges of illegal possession of an unregistered drone, a criminal o!ense under the country’s Anti-Terrorism Law. In China, Tohti, founder of a Uyghur news site, has served more than 10 years of his life sentence. In Turkey, Hatice Duman – one of four journalists in the country sentenced to life – has spent more than 20 years in jail in spite of a 2019 Constitutional Court #nding that her right to a free trial had been violated. Her retrial is ongoing. René Capain Bassène (Photo: Courtesy of the family of René Capain Bassène) https://cpj.org/thematic-reports/in-record-year-china-israel-and-myanmar-are-worlds-leading-jailers-of-journalists/ Page 5 of 27