Sudan: Persecuted Journalist Flees Country
Editor of Shuttered Newspaper Receives Grant for Writers at
Risk

(New York, November 12, 2003) -- A prominent independent
journalist has been forced to flee Sudan in the face of
persecution by the Sudanese government, Human Rights Watch said
today.

Nhial Bol, former managing editor and reporter at the Khartoum
Monitor, Sudan's only daily English-language newspaper [see in
Background section below], fled Sudan to Kenya in late October
following repeated government actions against the Monitor, and
arrests and threats against his life. The Monitor was shut down
several times this year by the government, most recently in
September. Human Rights Watch has repeatedly condemned the
Sudanese government's attacks on the independent media.

On November 1, Bol received an emergency grant from the
Hellman/Hammett fund for persecuted writers, which is
administered by Human Rights Watch. Last year the Monitor
received one of the annual Hellman/Hammett grants after
continual closings by security forces and spurious court
proceedings by the Sudanese government threatened the
newspaper's existence.

Bol intends to move to southern Sudan and start a newspaper in
the territories of the rebel Sudan People's Liberation
Movement/Army (SPLM/A). Ongoing peace negotiations to end the
20-year civil war between the SPLM/A and the government should
be finalized by the end of the year. The United States has
played a major role in mediating these peace talks. Under the
peace agreement, a regional government will be formed in the
south, with the SPLM/A as the dominant party.

As a rebel group, the SPLM/A has had no track record of
handling an independent press, because the rebel area lacks
suitable communications and infrastructure. As it becomes a key
player in the regional government, however, its performance
will be watched closely.

"An independent press will have a critical role to play in the future
of Sudan, both in the south as well as the north," said Jemera
Rone, Human Rights Watch's Sudan researcher. "The international
community needs to support Nhial Bol and other journalists like
him so that they can continue to shine a light on human rights
abuses."

Nhial Bol was managing editor of the Monitor since its founding in
2000. The only English-language daily in the country, the
newspaper served Khartoum's large southern Sudanese population
and reported on matters related to peace and dialogue between
northern and southern Sudan. The newspaper's articles on the
peace process between the government and the rebel SPLM/A,
human rights abuses by security forces, slavery, and the
treatment of southern Sudanese aroused the ire of the Khartoum
government, which subjected the Monitor and the rest of Sudan's
independent newspapers to censorship, intimidation and
confiscation. Bol was arrested on dozens of occasions by
government security forces.

After the government-controlled National Press Council in February
instructed newspapers not to report on the peace process, there
was a new wave of crackdowns against the independent press.
Monitor reporter Edward Tersu Lado was arrested and detained
for 10 days in March, and a Khartoum criminal court in May shut
down the Monitor for two months. In June, the Court of Crimes
Against the State, a Sudanese security court, revoked the
Monitor's publishing license permanently, found Bol and
reporter William Ezekiel guilty of crimes against the state,
and fined the newspaper 400,000 Sudanese dinars (US$1,554).
After being allowed to reopen on September 13, the newspaper
was ordered shut down again two days later. The Khartoum
Monitor remains closed.

Each year, Human Rights Watch presents Hellman/Hammett grants to
writers around the world who have been targets of political
persecution. The grant program began in 1989 when executors of
the estate of Lillian Hellman asked Human Rights Watch to
design a program in her name and that of her long-time
companion, novelist Dashiell Hammett, to provide assistance to
writers in financial need as a result of expressing their
views.