EJC Media News for Tuesday, August 14, 2007

An Eritrean journalist who attempted to flee his country's regime has gone missing since trying to slip over the dangerous border to Ethiopia in May, a press freedom group said Monday. Paris-based Reporters Without Borders (RSF) said in a statement that Johnny Hisabu, an editor with state-owned Eri-TV, disappeared late May after trying to escape to Ethiopia, where he had grown up. ‘There are unconfirmed reports that he was arrested when border guards intercepted the group of refugees he was traveling with, and that he has since been held at a detention center’ in the southwestern town of Barentu, RSF said in a statement. RSF said last month that another Eritrean journalist at Eri-TV, Paulos Kidane, died while trying to trek over the border to Sudan. Companions that he was traveling with said that he collapsed during the arduous march. (Middle East Times)