{"id":3491,"date":"2021-06-29T14:11:54","date_gmt":"2021-06-29T09:41:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ikhrw.com\/en\/?p=3491"},"modified":"2021-06-29T14:11:54","modified_gmt":"2021-06-29T09:41:54","slug":"kurdistan-region-government-sentences-6-journalists-to-43-years-in-prison","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ikhrw.com\/en\/article\/kurdistan-region-government-sentences-6-journalists-to-43-years-in-prison\/","title":{"rendered":"Kurdistan Region Government sentences 6 journalists to 43 years in prison!"},"content":{"rendered":"

It has been a hard week for journalists in Iraqi Kurdistan, that fear persecution and imprisonment for showing a more critical point-of-view of local political developments in the region, to the outside world. Six of their collegues have been sentenced to a combined shocking amount of 43 years in prison.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

According to the Metro Center for Journalists\u2019 Rights and Advocacy there were at least\u00a0385 violations<\/a>\u00a0against 291 journalists and media agencies during 2020, including assaults, arrests, office closures, and harassing lawsuits.<\/p>\n

Activists warn of a dangerous new era in Iraqi Kurdistan, a region which once prided itself as a\u00a0beacon of democracy<\/a>\u00a0but now imprisons,\u00a0harasses<\/a>,\u00a0assaults<\/a>, and\u00a0detains<\/a>\u00a0journalists.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Photojournalist gets secret trial without a lawyer present<\/h1>\n

 <\/p>\n

On June 24, Iraqi Kurdish photojournalist Qaraman Shukri told his mother during a prison visit that he had been sentenced to seven years in prison during a closed trial without a lawyer present, according to news reports<\/a> and the journalist\u2019s brother, Zeravan Shukri.<\/p>\n

Asayish security forces affiliated with Iraqi Kurdistan\u2019s ruling Democratic Party of Kurdistan arrested Shukri, a freelance photojournalist who has contributed to the news website Rojnews<\/em> and the broadcaster Sterk TV, on January 27, as CPJ documented<\/a> at the time.<\/p>\n

It is unclear when and where Qaraman Shukri was tried.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Qaraman Shukri. Source: CPJ.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

Appeals denied<\/h1>\n

 <\/p>\n

On Sunday, the court\u00a0upheld six year prisons sentences<\/a>\u00a0handed down against journalists Sherwan Sherwani, Guhdar Zebari, and Ayaz Karam and activists Shvan Saeed Omar and Hariwan Issa during a\u00a0nine-hour trial in February<\/a>\u00a0in which they were accused of seeking to undermine the security and stability of the state. An initial\u00a0appeal was denied in May<\/a>.<\/p>\n

It was their final opportunity to appeal their case.<\/p>\n

All five defendants strongly deny the charges against them, alleging that statements later used against them by the court were\u00a0obtained through coercion and threats against their families<\/a>\u00a0or simply fabricated by secret and unnamed witnesses cited by the Kurdistan Region’s Security Council.<\/p>\n

Politically motivated<\/h1>\n

 <\/p>\n

The prosecution is widely viewed as politically motivated, with their arrests coming in the context of an\u00a0extended crackdown<\/a>\u00a0on\u00a0journalists and activists<\/a>\u00a0by the security forces in\u00a0Duhok and Erbil governorates<\/a>, which are affiliated with the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP).<\/p>\n

In May, UNAMI\u00a0published a lengthy and detailed report<\/a>\u00a0about the marked deterioration of freedom of expression in the Kurdistan Region over the past year, pointing to a significant number of specific incidents where journalists were arbitrarily arrested, assaulted, served with harassing lawsuits, or otherwise had their rights violated by the KRG, the security forces, and the judiciary.<\/p>\n

European Union Ambassador to Iraq Martin Huth\u00a0tweeted on Sunday night<\/a>\u00a0that he was \u201cappalled\u201d by the decision to uphold their convictions, \u201cdespite serious procedural flaws and allegations of mistreatment identified by the UN.\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Sherwani, a freelance journalist, and Zebari, a reporter for the Kurdish website\u00a0Wllat News<\/em>, are both known locally for\u00a0their reporting on alleged corruption by Kurdistan regional authorities and\u00a0coverage of Turkish airstrikes in the region.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u2018PKK Spies\u2019<\/h1>\n

 <\/p>\n

The Kurdistan Region Security Council (KRSC) released videos of purported confessions from the five journalists and activists on 4 March. The KRSC said the five men had \u201cdirect\u201d links to the Kurdistan Workers\u2019 Party (PKK).<\/p>\n

“During the process of the interrogation, it has been proved through documents and confessions that they are directly linked to the PKK and a number of other parties. Upon their [PKK] request, they [defendants] gathered information about the bases of Asayish [internal security], Peshmerga, and Kurdistan judges,\u201d read a\u00a0statement<\/a><\/u>\u00a0from the KRSC.<\/p>\n

During an alleged phone call between Sherwani and an alleged PKK intelligence officer, the journalist detailed plans to attack a judge in Erbil who had been involved in the arrests of friends of his, saying \u201cWe want to harm him.\u201d The PKK intelligence officer promised training and logistic support.<\/p>\n

KRSC also released what it said was a chat on the Facebook Messenger app between co-defendants Sherwani and Zebari. In the chat, Sherwani said, \u201cDo you know how we can overcome the KDP? If there is a mafia group with advanced weapons, we can target each member of the KDP in a day.\u201d Duhok Governor Ali Tatar is among the names of purported targets.<\/p>\n

Sherwani also allegedly said he received $5,000 from an unnamed organization that had told him they had \u201ccoordination\u201d with foreign embassies in Iraq and offered to send him to abroad. This organization was named \u201cbar\u201d \u2013 and yes, that was the US Legal Bar Association.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe evidence was very circumstantial, nothing solid. There was a bit of spaghetti against the wall, like things that are mildly abnormal being somehow suspicious,\u201d one of the witnesses, Winthrop Rodgers, a senior editor\u00a0at Kurdish broadcaster NRT English, told CPJ<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Qaraman Shukri\u2019s employers are openly known to be PKK-affiliated channels.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

But is working for the opposition enough to get sentenced to prison?!<\/h1>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u201cFlawed trials in the Kurdistan Region are nothing new,\u201d said\u00a0Belkis Wille<\/a>, senior crisis and conflict researcher at Human Rights Watch.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese recent convictions only further compound the Kurdistan Region’s worsening reputation as a place where people can face unfair criminal trials merely for critiquing government policies they object to and expressing concerns about the political elites.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It has been a hard week for journalists in Iraqi Kurdistan, that fear persecution and imprisonment for showing a more critical point-of-view of local political developments in the region, to the outside world. Six of their collegues have been sentenced to a combined shocking amount of 43 years in prison.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":3493,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3491","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-article"],"yoast_head":"\nKurdistan Region Government sentences 6 journalists to 43 years in prison! - Iranian Kurdistan Human Rights Watch<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.ikhrw.com\/en\/article\/kurdistan-region-government-sentences-6-journalists-to-43-years-in-prison\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Kurdistan Region Government sentences 6 journalists to 43 years in prison!\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"It has been a hard week for journalists in Iraqi Kurdistan, that fear persecution and imprisonment for showing a more critical point-of-view of local political developments in the region, to the outside world. 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