South Sudan authorities have freed two Ugandan journalists who have been in detention since Saturday (July 27). Justin Dralaze and Hillary Ayesiga, who were filming in capital Juba without clearance, were held for four days before their release was secured at midday July 31.
A group which supports and protects the rights of journalists operating in sensitive or unstable environments has criticised the Sudanese People’s Liberation Army for holding the two visiting Ugandan journalists and their South Sudanese fixer and driver. Ayesiga and Dralaze were arrested with their driver Sunday David Tut on the airport road in Juba.
“The government’s silence about these three journalists’ place of detention and present state of health, and what they are alleged to have done, was unacceptable and worrying,” Reporters Without Borders said.
“We condemn the fact that they had no contact with the outside world since their arrest and we fear that they may have been mistreated.”
Reporters Without Borders criticised the regime’s paranoia and the brutality of its security forces in a 2012 report.
Following their arrest, the three journalists were reportedly taken to National Security Headquarters, which is notorious for the appalling conditions in which suspects are held. According to some official sources, they were arrested for having no documents proving they were journalists.
Ayesiga, who normally works for China’s CCTV, and Draleze, a former Reuters journalist in Uganda, were on assignment in Juba for Feature Story News (FSN) of the United States to cover the security and political situation after President Salva Kiir’s decision to fire his entire cabinet on July 23 and impose a curfew in the capital. Tut usually works for the South Sudanese radio station Liberty FM.
South Sudan is ranked 124th out of 179 countries in the 2013 Reporters Without Borders press freedom index, a fall of 13 places from its position the year before, when it was ranked for the first time.
