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On the second day of the 81st General Assembly of the Inter American Press Association (IAPA), the panel titled “Anatomy of Authoritarian Advance: Handbook of Tactics and Their Effect on the Media” was held, in which the strategies of authoritarian regimes to weaken press freedom in the region were presented.
The civil war in Sudan has displaced over 13 million people. It’s left more than 30 million in need of aid, of which just under 25 million are undergoing acute hunger. Within the vast scope of this humanitarian crisis, journalists on the ground in Sudan are being killed or displaced. This, in turn, is limiting the vital flow of information both inside and out of the country.
Several journalists from Afghanistan who are now living in exile say that access to information from inside the country has become one of their biggest challenges in reporting the news. They add that with the Taliban’s growing restrictions on the media and users of social networks, access to information for exiled media outlets is becoming increasingly difficult.
The main association monitoring attacks on journalists in El Salvador has become the latest victim of the country’s controversial Foreign Agents Law. The Salvadoran Journalists Association (APES, for its acronym in Spanish) announced on Oct. 1 that it will go into exile as a result of the law, which requires organizations receiving foreign funds to register with the government and levies large fines for those who don’t comply.
The Taliban, by imposing a nationwide shutdown of internet and telecommunications services in Afghanistan, have driven the final nail into the coffin of individual freedoms, development, and people’s connection with the outside world. Opponents of the Taliban and other citizens of the country have said that this move has not only dragged Afghanistan into absolute isolation in the 21st century, but has also thrown the daily lives of millions into crisis.
On September 22, the Václav Havel Library hosted a discussion titled “How to Run Media from Exile and Remain Relevant in Your Country – The Story of Mizzima and Myanmar’s Independent Media.” The event brought together Soe Myint, Managing Director and Editor-in-Chief of Mizzima, Toe Zaw Latt, General Secretary of the Independent Press Council of Myanmar, and No No Lin, Deputy Director of Mizzima Media.
Galina Timchenko and Ivan Kolpakov from the exile outlet Meduza describe their struggle to keep the independent media platform alive amid heavy internet blocks in Russia and growing financial pressure. Timchenko calls it a “war of attrition” waged by the Kremlin against free media.
A new UN report reveals that Iran threatens journalists across Europe, deeply affecting them and their families. Europe is doing too little in response. One of Iran’s most popular TV stations operates from London due to censorship at home. Journalist Mojtaba Pourmohsen fled to London but still faces death threats from Iran’s Revolutionary Guard—even in exile.
Swissinfo asked Olga Sadovskaya, vice-chair of rights group The Crew Against TortureExternal link and vice-president of the World Organization Against TortureExternal link, to demonstrate how Russia’s digital Iron Curtain works with and without a VPN. [Spoiler: Swissinfo’s website doesn’t load in the country without one.]
As the Trump administration ramps up immigration arrests, flooding the streets of Los Angeles with masked agents, it is simultaneously stripping half a million people of humanitarian protections that allowed them to enter the country legally — essentially turning them into undocumented immigrants and threatening to deport them.
Records of exile are kept by the organizations that bring together victims. According to data from APES and the Central American Network of Journalists (RCP for its initials in Spanish), at least 47 journalists left El Salvador between May and July 2025.
Civic space in Afghanistan remains rated as ‘closed’. Since the Taliban seized power in August 2021, the de facto authorities continue to commit human rights violations and crimes under international law against the Afghan people, especially women and girls, with absolute impunity. Civil society activists, journalists and others face severe restrictions, and activists have been arbitrarily arrested and detained for their criticism of the Taliban.
Even in exile, Egyptian journalist Basma Mostafa cannot escape her country’s grip: surveillance, intimidation, and threats have trailed her from Cairo to Germany. In Geneva, she tells a story that exposes the growing reach of transnational repression.
CPJ interviewed 10 Afghan journalists, inside and outside the country, who said that independent media, which used to reach millions of people, have largely been banned, suspended, or shuttered while key outlets have been taken over by the Taliban. None would publish their names, citing fear of reprisals.
With the Taliban in control, journalism lost its meaning. Widespread censorship, constant threats, and gender-based restrictions defined the daily lives of women journalists. Not only aspirations but also freedom of expression, job security, and even women’s physical presence in the media sphere faced serious challenges. Journalism—a profession once used to promote awareness and demand justice—became a dangerous battleground.
Independent media can be destroyed, journalists can be imprisoned — but they cannot be forced into silence. The starting point of the newest Belarusian history was August 9, 2020 — the day of voting in a presidential election that never truly happened. That day marked the beginning of a total purge of Belarus’s democratic society.
In a feature for LatAm Journalism Review, Silvia Higuera reveals how misogynistic online campaigns – from the #malqueridas hashtag to rape threats – push Central America’s women journalists further into exile. Their credibility, sources, and safety are under siege, even beyond borders.
In democratic nations, journalism plays the role of a watchdog. It questions authority, exposes corruption, and gives a voice to the voiceless. But in authoritarian states like the Islamic Republic of Iran, media is not a platform for truth—it is a platform for power.