Print-run of Akhir Lahza seized in Sudan’s capital

Security officers confiscated all copies of the Monday edition of Akhir Lahza daily newspaper from the printing works in Khartoum. No reason was provided.

As reported by Dabanga yesterday, the print-run of El Midan was confiscated, for the 10th time since the beginning of this year, on the same day.

The editor-in-chief of El Midan, Madeeha Abdallah told Dabanga that the current gagging campaign of the National Intelligence and Security Service (NISS) targets the entire Sudanese press, including the pro-government newspapers.

“The security apparatus is seeking to silence print media, as the regime considers any view deviating from their standpoint a source of danger.”

During the past three months, NISS agents confiscated more than 35 print-runs of various newspapers in Khartoum.

“The purpose of confiscating the print-runs is to exhaust the newspapers financially,” the editor-in-chief of El Jareeda newspaper commented to Dabanga in July 2014. “It is in fact a direct and methodical liquidation, meant to kill the independent press.”

According to the 2014 World Press Freedom Index, issued by Reporters Without Borders, Sudan rates within the bottom 10 of 180 countries surveyed.