Niger
Journalist freed after 86 days in prisonPosted Nov 18 2009
After 86 days in prison, Abdoulaye Tiémogo, editor of the independent weekly Le Canard Déchaîné, was released Oct. 26 when a court of appeals reduced his sentence to two months.
Tiémogo was sentenced to three months in prison Aug. 1 for “casting discredit on a judicial ruling.” He had made a comment on a private television channel in which he questioned the government’s decision to issue an international arrest warrant for exiled former Niger Prime Minister Hama Amadou on corruption charges.
Security officials forcefully removed Tiémogo from the hospital, where he was being treated for malaria and a stomach disorder, to have him incarcerated in the southeastern city of Ouallam.
Tiémogo called the prison’s conditions “appalling” in an interview with Reporters Without Borders.
“There were almost 20 of us in cells designed for four of five people,” he told RSF.
Tiémogo has been arrested five times since 2000. In 2003 he was forced to seek exile in Mali and in 2008, he told a newspaper in Burkina that he had been forced to flee his country to avoid certain death. Tiémogo had published an article suggesting President Mamadou Tandja planned to impose his son to succeed him if his bid to revise the constitution failed. The leader lodged a complaint and Tiémogo fled to neighboring Burkina in fear.
“When I thought about where I could go as soon as possible to avoid being killed, because that’s how it was, I told myself it was absolutely necessary to get to Burkina,” he said, according to IPI.
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