Sudan press curbs: newspapers seized for covering protests

Agents of the National Intelligence and Security Service (NISS) confiscated all printed copies of El Jareeda and El Tayyar newspapers because they covered the various protests in the country.

The journalists considered the confiscation of the newspapers as a clear violation of the  Media Charter of Honour  recently signed by editors-in-chief of Sudanese newspapers and the NISS, stipulating that the security apparatus would not interfere in the publication policies of newspapers and abolish censorship, including pre-censorship.

NISS officers prevented the Arab TV correspondent in Khartoum from covering the ongoing protests and gave him 24 hours to leave the country.

Arab TV reported on Twitter that the security apparatus prevented the channel’s service provider from providing production services to their office in Khartoum.

Yesterday, NISS officers summoned a number of directors of media companies providing news to international media to their offices. They instructed the media companies not to host guests or produce reports on the protests in the country.

The media in Sudan are continuously subjected to confiscations of newspapers, and summons and detentions of journalists. Sudan is ranked at the bottom of the World Press Freedom Index by Reporters Without Borders.