Writers At Risk
PEN’s bedrock work is long-term advocacy on behalf of individual writers who are being persecuted because of their work. This page features our highest priority cases. With the help of our members and supporters, we are carrying out campaigns to win their release and ensure they are safe and can write and publish freely.
Take a moment to share information about these writers and take action on their behalf. This is only a small sampling of writers under threat around the world.
Tohti Tunyaz | Status: Released | China/Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region
Tohti Tunyaz (pen name: Muzart) is an ethnic Uyghur historian and writer. He was released from Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region Prison No. 3 in the provincial capital of Urumqi… More
Zhang Jianhong (pen name: Li Hong) | Status: Deceased | China
Zhang Jianhong passed away on December 31, 2010, at a hospital in Ningbo City, Zhejiang Province. He was diagnosed with muscle atrophy and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), also known… More
Ven. Ngawang Phulchung | Status: Released | China/Tibet Autonomous Region
Ven. Ngawang Phulchung is the senior monk from Drepung monastery near Lhasa. He has also been singled out as the leader of the Drepung printing group, which secretly produced… More
Tal Al-Mallouhi | Status: In Prison | Syria
Tal Al-Mallouhi is a student, blogger, and poet from Homs, Syria, serving a five-year sentence for "divulging information to a foreign state." No evidence was disclosed to justify… More
Michel Kilo | Status: Released | Syria
Prominent writer and journalist Michel Kilo contributes to the leading Lebanese daily Al-Nahar and the London-based daily Al-Quds Al-Arabi. Initially, Kilo was arrested on May 14, 2006 when he… More
Yang Tongyan | Status: Deceased | China
A writer and member of the Independent Chinese PEN Center, Yang Tongyan was sentenced to 12 years imprisonment for “subversion of state power,” and died in November 2017 while… More
Aref Dalila | Status: Released | Syria
Dr. Aref Dalila, born in 1942, is a writer and former economics professor and Dean of the Faculty of Economics at Damascus University. He was an advocate of political… More
Tsering Woeser | Status: Under Threat | China
Award-winning Tibetan writer and poet Woeser was born in 1966 in Lhasa, Tibet Autonomous Region, where her father was a soldier in the People’s Liberation Army. More
J. S. Tissainayagam | Status: Released | Sri Lanka
J. S. Tissainayagam is a Tamil journalist for the Sunday Times whose articles have also been published in the magazine North-Eastern Monthly. He was also editor of the news… More
Stanislav Dmitrievsky | Status: Under Threat | Russia
Stanislav Dmitrievsky, a human rights advocate, is continually under threat for his work promoting human rights in Chechnya. More
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PEN America On 
Oakland, Calif., voted to pass an ordinance that would ban municipal use of face recognition technology: https://t.co/LT1PgbmBLQ. Read more on mounting bipartisan concern over facial recognition: https://t.co/fNmeQXtG0z via @thomasomelia for @aminterest.
These Journalists Are Facing Huge Threats And Injustice For Pursuing The Truth: https://t.co/OWrh3QSF6X via @BuzzFeedNews. PEN America continues to advocate on behalf of individual writers who are being persecuted because of their work: https://t.co/LUzJMNFFmZ. #pressfreedom