NYT JOURNALIST BRIEFLY DETAINED IN BAHRAIN

The New York Times journalist Kick Kristoff was briefly detained by the police while covering a protest in Bahrain on Friday 9 December 2011. The columnist and his videographer Adam Ellick were covering the police reaction to the protests, with also use of tear gas, when they were stopped and held for a while in police car without justification; the two said to have been tear gassed and their camera was damaged. Bahrain authorities denied any charge, justifying their action with the necessity to protect them. It is not the first time that foreign journalists are prevented to assist and cover demonstrations in Bahrain; the same happened a few days earlier to Reuter’s photojournalist Hamad Mohamed and Mazen Mahdi from EPA/DPA. While the US government is finally becoming concerned about the mistreatment of the demonstrators in Bahrain – as for the case of rights activist Nabeel Rajab -, the authorities are trying to restrict the spread of news about the situation in the Arab country.