Abdelmoundji Khelladi

Khelladi publishes his writing about politics online and in independent outlets. He was covering a protest when officers arrested him on October 7, 2019, holding him in detention for… More

Writers at Risk Database

Mohammed Benchicou

Former director of daily newspaper Le Matin, Benchicou was arrested in 2003 on pretense of a currency violation. Though released in 2006, he was forced to shutter his newspaper… More

Mohammed Benchicou

Mohammed Benchicou | Status: Released | Algeria

Mohammed Benchicou is the former director of Le Matin, a private daily newspaper that maintained an independent, critical editorial line toward the Algerian government. On August 23, 2003, Benchicou was… More

Mykola Semena

Mykola Semena | Status: Released | Ukraine

Mykola Semena was convicted under the “separatist” Article 280.1 of the Russian Criminal Code, for publicly denouncing the Kremlin’s annexation of Crimea. He was handed a 2-year suspended sentence.… More

Necmiye Alpay

Necmiye Alpay | Status: Released | Turkey

Necmiye Alpay is a Turkish translator, editor, journalist and staunch defender of free expression More

Stanislav Aseyev

Stanislav Aseyev | Status: Released | Ukraine

Ukrainian journalist Stanislav Aseyev, who writes under the pen name Vasin, was captured by Russian-supported rebels on June 2, 2017. Aseyev was based in the separatist-controlled city of Donetsk and… More

Oleh Halaziuk | Status: Released | Ukraine

Oleh Halaziuk, a columnist for Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL), has been detained since August 2017 by Russian-supported rebels in the Donetsk region of Eastern Ukraine.  More

Oleg Sentsov

Oleg Sentsov | Status: Released | Russia

Oleg Sentsov, a Ukrainian film director, was sentenced to 20 years in a Russian prison on charges of terrorism on August 25, 2015. PEN believes that the charges stem… More

Roman Sushchenko

Roman Sushchenko | Status: Released | Russia

Roman Sushchenko, a Ukrainian journalist, was detained in Moscow on September 30, 2016, on charges of espionage, and has since been detained in Lefortovo Prison. Russia's Federal Security Service (FSB)… More

Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo seated in front of computers

Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo | Status: Released | Myanmar

Prosecutors have charged the journalists with obtaining important and secret state documents relating to the crisis in Rakhine State, from which some 680,000 Rohingya Muslims have fled since August… More