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On World Press Freedom Day, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillay, and the UN Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression, Frank La Rue, right, urge all states to live up to their commitments to protect journalists from political interference and physical threat.

In relation to the forthcoming local elections in the Republic of Croatia, Centre for Peace Studies – Zagreb, CMS, wants to focus attention on cases of threats and violence towards activists on the local level, for their engagement and public action on local subjects and issues. For that purpose, CMS has developed a questionnaire to archive and track cases of violence and threats against human rights activists in the Republic of Croatia.

On March, the 15th Russian President Dmitry Medvedev held a meeting with the members of the presidential Council for Promoting Civil Society and Human Rights. Within the meeting a wide range of problems has being discussed including courts ‘ independence, attacks on human rights activists and journalists, ecology issues, youth problems, relations between authorities and NGOs etc.

-We, members of the Ethiopian Free Press Journalists Association (EFJA) in exile all over the world, observe today, 3 May 2009, with highly charged emotions. Thus begins an official EFJA statement issued today, on World Press Freedom Day. -We are very disturbed over the persistent authoritarian and brutal behavior of the government of Meles Zenawi, which succeeded in effectively putting all the financial, material, manpower and institutional services and resources of the state bureaucracy under its monopolistic hold to suppress and finally silence the independent press, the only formal outlet of the people in the country.

The DR Congo is experiencing, in many of its provinces, conflicts or continued ethnic tensions that could erupt at any time. Whether in Kivu, Oriental province (especially in Ituri), the two Kasai provinces, Katanga or Equateur, cultural differences, which are symbols of national wealth, are stirred up and often exacerbated by politicians to satisfy their ambitions.

To mark World Press Freedom Day 2009, Index on Censorship asked a panel of experts what needs to be done to protect the press in the year ahead.

Ivan Roman, right, was detained by KGB officers for his article covering the economic crisis in the Republic of Belarus. He must write something positive about the authorities, they warned. Otherwise he was threatened with a criminal case.

Front Line is deeply concerned following reports of an intense media smear campaign against human rights defenders who work in lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex (LGBTI) human rights organisations, including Sexual Minorities Republic of Uganda (SMUG).

Novaya Gazeta, the Moscow newspaper that has paid a deadly price for its reporting during a period when the Kremlin has sought to rein in independent media, has been named winner of the International Press Institute’s 2009 Free Media Pioneer Award. Right, Gazeta Editor Dmitry Muratov observing last rites over the coffin of one of the four Novaya Gazeta journalists who have been killed in recent years.

More than 100,000 displaced civilians in Lubero territory in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo desperately need protection from further attacks by Rwandan militias and Congolese forces, Human Rights Watch said today. Human Rights Watch called on the United Nations peacekeeping force and humanitarian agencies to take urgent steps to increase protection and assistance to the civilians at risk.

The Somali Independent News Agency (SOMINA) was unveiled today in Djibouti by Omar Faruk Osman Nur, right, the secretary-general of the National Union of Somali journalists, and Robert Ménard, the head of the Doha Centre for Media Freedom. It is intended to be an independent source of reliable and objective news about Republic of Somalia, one of Africa’s most troubled countries.

The country that suffered the most from the worst atomic catastrophe in 20th century plans to build its own nuclear power plant. Protesters against murky government plans are forcefully silenced.