Dear Friends and Partners of the Justice for Journalists Foundation!
Please accept our warmest season’s greetings. We wish you a happy and prosperous New Year and Merry Christmas! In this final newsletter for 2024, we would like to thank you for all your support this year.
At the Justice for Journalists Foundation, we tirelessly work to defend media freedom and protect journalists by monitoring violations and organising safety trainings.
Your donation will help us to continue this vital work. Get in touch with us via info@jfj.fund.
Declining state of media freedom in post-Soviet autocracies
The Justice for Journalists Foundation, together with its regional partners, has been monitoring press freedom violations in post-Soviet countries (excluding the Baltic states) since 2017 and publishing the results on its Media Risk Map. During the Council of Europe’s Annual Thematic Conference in Strasbourg, JFJ presented its analysis of the main methods of silencing independent voices in the Post-Soviet autocracies.
In Azerbaijan, Belarus, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Tajikistan, and Turkmenistan, the state authorities perpetrated at least 77% of verified incidents. While the attacks via judicial means remain the primary method of silencing the media, the number of physical attacks against journalists in Azerbaijan, Georgia and Russia remains worryingly high.
The peak number of attacks against media workers in 2020-2022 forced them to exile abroad. However, many are being targeted even in their new host countries. Transnational attacks involving the cooperation of two or more states in repressions against journalists are on the rise. In the most recent case on November 28, the Tbilisi City Court ruled to approve the extradition of Afgan Sadigov, an Azerbaijani journalist who has been in custody in Gldani prison in Tbilisi since August 4. His wife has said that Sadigov’s life would be in danger in Azerbaijan.
With your support, the Justice for Journalists Foundation will continue to monitor and raise awareness about attacks on media workers and educate professional and citizen journalists on mitigating various risks.
Please vote here if you would be interested in subscribing to Media Freedom Updates in 2025.
Georgia: JFJ and press freedom organisations condemn assault on journalists during demonstrations in Tbilisi
The Justice for Journalists Foundation joined international press freedom, freedom of expression and journalists organisations to strongly condemn what appears to be a targeted, deliberate attack on journalists by state security forces during pro-EU protests triggered by Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze’s announcement that Georgia would halt its EU membership negotiations until the end of 2028. Violence against journalists is unacceptable. Georgian authorities have an obligation to ensure a safe and enabling environment for members of the press. We call on Georgian authorities to immediately cease the ongoing assault on independent and critical media.
EVENTS AND ADVOCACY
- On 20 November, JFJ’s team attended the Freedom of Expression Awards organised by the Index on Censorship in London, UK. The winner of the Trustee Award was Russian human rights activist Evgenia Kara-Murza, the wife of Vladimir Kaza-Murza, a Russian politician and journalist imprisoned in Russia from April 2022 until August 2024 for speaking out against the war in Ukraine.
- On 25 November, JFJ’s Director Maria Ordzhonikidze participated in the workshop Training on Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation organised by the Centre for Freedom of the Media (CFOM) at the University of Sheffield, UK. The workshop brought together UK and international experts and addressed various issues, including what journalists need to know about SLAPPs, how they can identify a SLAPP, where they should turn to if they are subject to one, and what training journalists concerning SLAPPs need.
- On December 2-3, JFJ’s Director spoke at the Media Forum held in Chișinău, Republic of Moldova, about the safety of journalists in the post-Soviet region. The event was opened by the president of Moldova, Maia Sandu, and was attended by journalists, international experts and representatives of state institutions. Among the topics discussed were journalists’ safety, subsidizing the media, determining levers to protect journalists from attacks, and amending the code of ethics.
- On December 4, the JFJ participated in the National Committee for the Safety of Journalists meeting in London, UK. During the meeting, the progress made against the updated National Action Plan for the Safety of Journalists was discussed, and the next steps for 2025 were outlined.
- On December 9, the documentary Of Caravan and the Dogs, supported by the JFJ Investigative Grant Programme, was screened during the Solidarity Human Rights Film Festival in Tel Aviv.
In November, the 2402 Foundation conducted Hostile Environment First Aid Training (HEFAT) + VR training in Kyiv, Ukraine. Another training was held on December 6-8. This training was designed for journalists working in dangerous or unstable regions, and covers topics such as identifying threats, behavior during shelling, avoiding kidnapping, basic first aid, local orientation, and other essential skills.
If you are a media worker and require safety training of any kind, please do not hesitate to write a request to academy@jfj.fund.