By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
OCTOBER 6, 2016
DILI, East Timor — Two East Timorese journalists are going
on trial in a criminal defamation case brought by the country's prime minister
that has alarmed press freedom groups.
Raimundos Oki and his former boss Lourenco Vicente Martins
are charged with "slanderous denunciation" and face up to three years
in prison if found guilty. The trial is set to begin Friday.
Rights groups and press advocates have urged that the case
be dropped.
Oki and Martins published a story in the Timor Post last
year about Prime Minister Rui Aria de Araujo's involvement in a state contract
for information technology services when he was an adviser to East Timor's
finance minister in 2014.
The story, which said Araujo had recommended a particular
company for the contract before bids opened, misidentified that company as the
eventual winner of the contract.
The newspaper apologized for that error, published a
front-page story on Araujo's denial and Martins, the editor, resigned. But
Araujo has insisted on prosecuting under draconian laws that can be used to
stifle investigative journalism.
"My story made him furious and he brought me to
court," said Oki.
East Timor is one of the world's youngest democracies and
its fragile press freedom has come attack with the passing of a restrictive
media law in 2014. A former colony of Portugal, it was occupied by Indonesia
for a quarter century until a U.N.-sponsored independence referendum in 1999
sparked violent reprisals by the Indonesian military that killed many and
destroyed its economy.
Santina da Costa, current editor of the Timor Post, said journalists
should not be subjected to criminal prosecutions related to their work.
"As citizens, we would be subject to the law," she
said. "But the government should not charge our journalists under the
criminal code."
The Committee to Protect Journalists, Freedom House and the
International Federation of Journalists have urged Araujo to drop the criminal
complaint.
In a July 19 letter to the prime minister, the three groups
called the case an "attack on press freedom and the right to
information" in East Timor. "As a matter of principle criminal
prosecutions of journalists cannot be tolerated."
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