The Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies (CIHRS) has demanded the unconditional release of independent journalist Ihsane el Kadi in Algeria.

Development Diaries reports that El Kadi, who has been in detention since December 2022, was sentenced to five years in prison in April 2023 on bogus charges.

It is understood that dozens of journalists in Algeria have been arrested and or prosecuted since 2020 as part of the Algerian government’s wider crackdown on the right to free expression.

‘Such a brazenly politicized judgment, imposing a heavy sentence on a person without demonstrating any wrongdoing, undoubtedly demonstrates the willingness of Algerian authorities to crush the remaining critical voices in the country’, Research Director at CIHRS, Amna Guellali, said.

El Kadi was arrested at his home shortly after midnight on 24 December, 2022. The following day, security forces in plainclothes took him in handcuffs to the shared premises of his two online media outlets, Radio M and Maghreb Emergent.

His media outlets had been among the very few independent media outlets that survived state repression in Algeria.

Both article 95 and article 95 of the Algerian Penal Code contravene international human rights law, as they contain a broadly and vaguely worded criminalisation of acts that are not clearly defined to allow individuals to reasonably predict whether any of their activities would amount to a crime.

Algeria is rated ‘not free’ in Freedom House’s Freedom in the World 2023 study of political rights and civil liberties worldwide.

According to Reporters Without Borders (RSF), the independent media are under pressure in Algeria as journalists are often jailed and prosecuted, with several websites blocked.

Photo source: CIHRS