Ladder: detention and violence
Arrest, detention, prosecution, imprisonment, physical harm or killing of journalists, where police, soldiers, officials or others acting for a government carried out, ordered or authorised the act. Harm by private people is recorded only when a government actor was involved.
The number of entries reflects the depth of this record, not the severity of a country's conduct.
Restrict
Limiting access or credentials for particular reporters or outlets: bans from briefings or buildings, pool changes, credential revocations, accreditation refusals.
| Date | Country | Head of government | What was done | Outcome | Sources |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| January 17, 1991 | Focal case United States (RSF 2026 rank: 64th of 180) | George H. W. Bush | The U.S. military required reporters covering the 1991 Gulf War to work in escorted "pools" rather than move freely, reviewed pool dispatches before release, and reporters who left the pools were captured or detained. Full entry | Sustained (February 28, 1991) | 2 |
| July 20, 2021 | Canada (RSF 2026 rank: 20th of 180) | John Horgan | A British Columbia court found the Royal Canadian Mounted Police had failed to justify wide exclusion zones that kept journalists away from its enforcement of a logging injunction at the Fairy Creek old-growth blockades, and ordered police to keep the media's role in a free society in mind when dec… Full entry | Reversed (July 20, 2021) | 1 |
Punish
Legal or physical action against individual journalists or sources: subpoenas and record seizures, prosecutions, arrests, detention, expulsions, visa denials, assault where a government actor is involved.
| Date | Country | Head of government | What was done | Outcome | Sources |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| July 5, 2010 | Focal case United States (RSF 2026 rank: 64th of 180) | Barack Obama | The U.S. Army charged intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning under the Espionage Act, a 1917 law against disclosing defense information, after she gave WikiLeaks, a website that publishes leaked documents, a large archive of military and diplomatic files that news organizations later published. Full entry | Reversed (January 17, 2017) | 1 |
| May 29, 2020 | Focal case United States (RSF 2026 rank: 64th of 180) | Tim Walz | Minnesota State Patrol troopers arrested CNN correspondent Omar Jimenez and his crew on live television while they covered protests after the police killing of George Floyd. Full entry | Reversed (May 29, 2020) | 2 |
| May 29, 2020 | Focal case United States (RSF 2026 rank: 64th of 180) | Jacob Frey | Freelance photojournalist Linda Tirado was struck in the face by a less-lethal round fired by Minneapolis police while covering protests over George Floyd's killing, permanently blinding her in one eye; the city settled her lawsuit for $600,000 in 2022 while continuing to deny an officer had fired… Full entry | Sustained (May 26, 2022) | 2 |
| July 23, 2020 | Focal case United States (RSF 2026 rank: 64th of 180) | Donald Trump | After federal officers deployed to Portland used tear gas, pepper spray and rubber bullets on journalists and legal observers covering protests, the American Civil Liberties Union sued, and a federal judge issued a preliminary injunction barring officers from dispersing, arresting or using force ag… Full entry | Reversed (July 23, 2020) | 3 |
| November 6, 2021 | Focal case United States (RSF 2026 rank: 64th of 180) | Joe Biden | FBI agents raided Project Veritas founder James O'Keefe's New York home and seized his phones as part of an investigation into the alleged theft of a diary belonging to Ashley Biden, President Biden's daughter, which the group had reported on; O'Keefe was never charged. Full entry | Unknown | 1 |
| August 11, 2023 | Focal case United States (RSF 2026 rank: 64th of 180) | Laura Kelly | Police in Marion, Kansas, led by Chief Gideon Cody, raided the Marion County Record's newsroom and publisher Eric Meyer's home, seizing computers, phones and files, on a warrant tied to an identity-theft investigation. Full entry | Reversed (August 5, 2024) | 3 |
| June 9, 2025 | Focal case United States (RSF 2026 rank: 64th of 180) | Karen Bass | A law enforcement officer shot Nine News Australia correspondent Lauren Tomasi with a rubber bullet while she was reporting live from a Los Angeles protest against federal immigration raids, prompting Australia's prime minister to call the incident unacceptable and raise it with the U.S. government. Full entry | Unknown | 1 |
| August 18, 2013 | United Kingdom (RSF 2026 rank: 18th of 180) | David Cameron | British authorities detained David Miranda, partner of Guardian journalist Glenn Greenwald, for nine hours at Heathrow Airport under anti-terrorism powers, and separately had Guardian staff destroy hard drives holding files leaked by Edward Snowden rather than hand them to a court. Full entry | Upheld by a court (January 19, 2016) | 3 |
| December 29, 2013 | Egypt (RSF 2026 rank: 169th of 180) | Adly Mansour | Months after the military removed President Mohamed Morsi, Egyptian security forces arrested Al Jazeera English journalists Peter Greste, Mohamed Fahmy and Baher Mohamed at a Cairo hotel; courts later convicted them of aiding a banned organization, and international pressure led to pardons. Full entry | Reversed (September 23, 2015) | 3 |
| February 13, 2019 | Philippines (RSF 2026 rank: 114th of 180) | Rodrigo Duterte | Philippine agents arrested Rappler executive editor Maria Ressa at the outlet's Manila office and held her overnight on a cyber libel case tied to a 2012 story, published before the cybercrime law used to charge her existed. Note: Philippine agents arrested an outlet's executive editor at her own newsroom over a story published years before the cybercrime law used to charge her existed; United States detentions in the record ended without charges filed. Full entry | Reversed (February 14, 2019) | 3 |
| November 1, 2023 | Türkiye (RSF 2026 rank: 163rd of 180) | Recep Tayyip Erdoğan | Turkish authorities detained three journalists, jailing columnist Tolga Sardan pending trial, under a 2022 law criminalizing the spread of disinformation, after the government's own disinformation-fighting body disputed their reporting on a leaked intelligence document and a story about released pr… Full entry | Ongoing | 2 |
| July 28, 2024 | Venezuela (RSF 2026 rank: 159th of 180) | Nicolas Maduro | In the two weeks after Venezuela's disputed July 28, 2024 presidential election, Reporters Without Borders documented 70 press-freedom violations, including nine detentions, nine expulsions of foreign correspondents and the suspension of the social media platform X, as President Nicolas Maduro's go… Full entry | Sustained | 2 |
| January 16, 2025 | Tunisia (RSF 2026 rank: 137th of 180) | Kais Saied | The Committee to Protect Journalists found at least four journalists imprisoned under Tunisia's 2022 Decree-Law 54 on cybercrime as of January 2025, including radio hosts Mourad Zghidi and Borhen Bsaies, pushing the country's jailed-journalist count to its highest since 1992 under President Kais Sa… Full entry | Sustained | 2 |
| February 3, 2025 | Bangladesh (RSF 2026 rank: 152nd of 180) | Muhammad Yunus | On a single day in February 2025, groups of men beat at least eight journalists in two separate incidents in rural Bangladesh while they investigated a medical-negligence tip and a land dispute; the incidents came as the interim government led by Muhammad Yunus drafted new cyber ordinances rights g… Full entry | Ongoing | 1 |
| March 19, 2025 | Türkiye (RSF 2026 rank: 163rd of 180) | Recep Tayyip Erdoğan | After the detention of the mayor of Istanbul, Ekrem İmamoğlu, on March 19, 2025, protests spread in Türkiye, and between March 19 and March 28, 2025, the authorities detained at least 13 journalists, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), a non-profit organization in New York. Full entry | Unknown (April 2, 2025) | 1 |
| September 3, 2025 | Ethiopia (RSF 2026 rank: 148th of 180) | Abiy Ahmed | Ethiopian authorities arrested at least six journalists between August and September 2025, including three from Sheger FM after the Ethiopian Media Authority ordered the station to delete a broadcast it accused of bias and inciting violence, ahead of national elections scheduled for 2026. Full entry | Ongoing (September 22, 2025) | 1 |
| September 5, 2025 | Serbia (RSF 2026 rank: 104th of 180) | Aleksandar Vucic | The Committee to Protect Journalists documented at least 28 Serbian journalists reporting being struck, detained, sprayed with chemical irritants or having their equipment destroyed by police between June and September 2025 while covering nationwide anti-government protests; the interior ministry d… Full entry | Ongoing | 1 |
| February 10, 2026 | India (RSF 2026 rank: 157th of 180) | Narendra Modi | On February 10, 2026, a court in India sentenced the investigative journalist Ravi Nair to one year in prison and a fine of 5,000 rupees (about US$55) for criminal defamation, an offence under which a statement that damages someone's reputation can lead to a fine or prison sentence. Full entry | Unknown (February 10, 2026) | 2 |
Silence
Removing outlets or channels from the public sphere: closures, licence withdrawals, forced sales, blocking and shutdowns, prior restraint, nationalisation.
| Date | Country | Head of government | What was done | Outcome | Sources |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| July 17, 1950 | South Africa (RSF 2026 rank: 21st of 180) | Daniel François Malan | Under Prime Minister Daniel François Malan, South Africa's parliament approved the Suppression of Communism Act in 1950, defining communism broadly enough to cover most opposition to apartheid. Full entry | Reversed (February 2, 1990) | 4 |
| September 21, 1972 | Philippines (RSF 2026 rank: 114th of 180) | Ferdinand Marcos | President Ferdinand Marcos declared martial law on September 21, 1972, and the next day ordered the military to take over nearly every newspaper, radio and television station in the Philippines, jailing prominent publishers and editors and requiring government clearance for whatever remained. Full entry | Reversed (February 25, 1986) | 2 |
| September 11, 1973 | Chile (RSF 2026 rank: 70th of 180) | Augusto Pinochet | On the day of the September 11, 1973 military coup that overthrew President Salvador Allende, Chile's armed forces bombed and shut down radio stations that opposed the takeover, arrested journalists and closed newspapers aligned with the ousted government, under the military junta led by Augusto Pi… Full entry | Sustained (March 1, 1990) | 2 |
| July 31, 1980 | South Korea (RSF 2026 rank: 47th of 180) | Chun Doo-hwan | Under General Chun Doo-hwan's martial-law government, South Korean authorities ordered newsrooms in 1980 to purge journalists who had resisted press controls or joined a May sit-in strike for press freedom, and closed 172 periodicals, dismissing roughly 2,000 journalists in total. Full entry | Reversed (June 1, 1987) | 2 |
| December 13, 1981 | Poland (RSF 2026 rank: 27th of 180) | Wojciech Jaruzelski | On December 13, 1981, General Wojciech Jaruzelski declared martial law in Poland, cutting phone and telex lines, suspending nearly all newspapers, and interning thousands of people, most Solidarity trade union journalists among them, within days. Full entry | Reversed (July 22, 1983) | 2 |
| September 18, 1988 | Myanmar (RSF 2026 rank: 166th of 180) | Saw Maung | After crushing the 1988 pro-democracy uprising, Burma's new military government, the State Law and Order Restoration Council, tightened an existing pre-publication press controls board and raised penalties for unauthorized publishing to seven years in prison, while denying any press controls existe… Full entry | Ongoing (January 1, 1989) | 2 |
| March 8, 2021 | Myanmar (RSF 2026 rank: 166th of 180) | Min Aung Hlaing | Weeks after seizing power, Myanmar's military junta revoked the operating licenses of five independent media outlets covering protests against the coup and raided two of their newsrooms, seizing computers and files; journalists from the outlets were later arrested and charged under a broadened pena… Full entry | Sustained | 2 |
| May 18, 2021 | Belarus (RSF 2026 rank: 165th of 180) | Alexander Lukashenko | Belarusian authorities blocked access to Tut.by, the country's most-read independent news site, searched its offices in three cities and arrested at least eleven staff, including its editor-in-chief, citing alleged media-law violations after the site had already lost its official media status. Full entry | Sustained | 3 |
Eliminate
Long imprisonment, killing, disappearance or forced exile of journalists, with state involvement as the sources state it.
| Date | Country | Head of government | What was done | Outcome | Sources |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| March 24, 1976 | Argentina (RSF 2026 rank: 98th of 180) | Jorge Rafael Videla | Hours after seizing power on March 24, 1976, Argentina's military junta, led by General Jorge Videla, issued Communiqué No. 19, threatening up to 10 years in prison for reporting favorable to groups it called subversive. Full entry | Reversed (December 10, 1983) | 2 |
| 1981 | Haiti (RSF 2026 rank: 107th of 180) | Jean-Claude Duvalier | Under President Jean-Claude Duvalier, Haitian authorities arrested and deported staff of Radio Haiti-Inter, an independent station that had reported critically on the government, forcing its director, journalist Jean Dominique, into exile in 1981. Full entry | Reversed (February 1, 1986) | 3 |
| July 1995 | Nigeria (RSF 2026 rank: 112th of 180) | Sani Abacha | A special military tribunal convicted four Nigerian journalists as accessories to a supposed 1995 coup plot after they reported on it, sentencing them to lengthy prison terms with no right of appeal, under the military government of General Sani Abacha. Full entry | Reversed (June 15, 1998) | 2 |
| September 18, 2001 | Eritrea (RSF rank: not recorded) | Isaias Afwerki | Eritrea's government closed every private newspaper and jailed at least nineteen journalists, including Dawit Isaac of the paper Setit, without charge or trial in September 2001, after suspending the constitution. Note: Eritrea jailed at least nineteen journalists without charge, trial or public acknowledgment of their fate after suspending its constitution, and has not accounted for several of them in over two decades; no United States detention in the record has approached that duration. Full entry | Ongoing | 3 |
| October 7, 2006 | Russia (RSF 2026 rank: 172nd of 180) | Vladimir Putin | Anna Politkovskaya, a Novaya Gazeta journalist known for reporting critical of Russia's conduct of the war in Chechnya, was shot dead in her Moscow apartment building; a Moscow court later convicted a former police officer of organizing surveillance for her killers. Note: Who ordered the killing was never conclusively established in court. Full entry | Upheld by a court (June 9, 2014) | 3 |
| September 1, 2015 | Azerbaijan (RSF rank: not recorded) | Ilham Aliyev | A Baku court convicted investigative journalist Khadija Ismayilova on business and tax charges and sentenced her to seven and a half years in prison, in a case CPJ said was payback for her reporting on official corruption. Note: Azerbaijan imprisoned an investigative reporter for over a year on charges connected to her reporting on the president's family's business holdings; no United States case in the record has produced a multi-year sentence. Full entry | Reversed (May 25, 2016) | 3 |
| September 3, 2018 | Myanmar (RSF 2026 rank: 166th of 180) | Aung San Suu Kyi | A Myanmar court sentenced Reuters reporters Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo to seven years under the colonial-era Official Secrets Act after police handed them classified documents at a dinner shortly before their arrest, while they were investigating the killing of Rohingya Muslim villagers. Note: Both reporters were pardoned in May 2019 after 511 days in prison. Full entry | Reversed (May 7, 2019) | 2 |
| October 2, 2018 | Saudi Arabia (RSF 2026 rank: 176th of 180) | Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud | Jamal Khashoggi, a Washington Post columnist and critic of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, was killed by Saudi agents inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul; the CIA concluded the crown prince ordered the killing, which Saudi Arabia denied. Full entry | Unknown | 2 |
| May 14, 2020 | China (RSF 2026 rank: 178th of 180) | Xi Jinping | China detained citizen journalist Zhang Zhan for posting independent video reports from Wuhan during the early COVID-19 outbreak, later convicting her of "picking quarrels and provoking trouble" and, after her release, detaining her again years later. Note: China imprisoned a citizen journalist for four years over her Wuhan reporting, then opened a second case against her after release; United States detention incidents in the record ended in release the same day. Full entry | Ongoing | 2 |
| February 8, 2023 | Belarus (RSF 2026 rank: 165th of 180) | Alexander Lukashenko | Belarus sentenced Polish-Belarusian correspondent Andrzej Poczobut to eight years in prison on charges of inciting hatred and calling for sanctions, after holding him since March 2021. Note: Belarus sentenced a correspondent to eight years for reporting on its Polish minority and held him nearly five years before an exchange; comparable United States detentions in the record ended in hours, not years. Full entry | Reversed (April 28, 2026) | 3 |
| March 29, 2023 | Russia (RSF 2026 rank: 172nd of 180) | Vladimir Putin | Russia arrested Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich in March 2023 on an espionage charge his employer called fabricated, held him for about 15 months before a closed trial, and sentenced him to 16 years before releasing him in a prisoner exchange. Note: Russia held a Wall Street Journal reporter for over a year on an espionage charge his employer called fabricated, then sentenced him to sixteen years; United States detentions of journalists in the record have not led to years-long imprisonment on state charges. Full entry | Reversed (August 1, 2024) | 3 |
| June 14, 2023 | Guatemala (RSF 2026 rank: 128th of 180) | Alejandro Giammattei | A Guatemalan court convicted El Periodico founder Jose Ruben Zamora of money laundering and sentenced him to six years in prison, months after his newspaper, known for investigating government corruption, was forced to close; press-freedom groups said the case was connected to his investigative rep… Full entry | Ongoing | 2 |
| December 15, 2025 | Hong Kong (RSF 2026 rank: 140th of 180) | John Lee | On December 15, 2025, the High Court of Hong Kong, a special administrative region of China with its own courts, convicted Jimmy Lai, founder of the newspaper Apple Daily, on two counts of "conspiracy to commit collusion with foreign forces" under the National Security Law, which China's central go… Full entry | Sustained (February 8, 2026) | 5 |
All ladders · Detention and violence: by country and year · The United States chapter