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.
Aung Myint | Status: Released | Myanmar
Aung Myint (also known as Phya Pon Ni Loan Oo) is a journalist, poet, and head of the information department of the National League for Democracy (NLD). Aung started… More
Zaw Thet Htwe | Status: Released | Myanmar
Zaw Thet Htwe, respected journalist and political advocate, worked as an editor and journalist at First Eleven Sports News, a popular sports journal Burma. After Cyclone Nargis struck on… More
Muhammad Bekjanov | Status: Released | Uzbekistan
A prominent Uzbek journalist in the period immediately following the collapse of the Soviet Union, Muhammad Bekjanov came to be recognized as a leading voice in the struggle for… More
Ruslan Sharipov | Status: In Exile | Uzbekistan
Ruslan Sharipov was one of several dozen students chosen to participate in a government-sponsored exchange program with U.S. universities in the fall of 1999. When Uzbek authorities canceled that… More
Ragip Zarakolu | Status: In Exile | Turkey
Ragip Zarakolu, director and owner of Belge Publishing House and a longtime activist against censorship, is on trial for "aiding and abetting an illegal organization" under Turkey's sweeping anti-terror… More
Nay Phone Latt | Status: Released | Myanmar
Nay Phone Latt, an influential Burmese blogger and poet, was released on January 13, 2013, during a widespread amnesty. He had spent nearly four years behind bars for his… More
Lê Chi Quang | Status: Released | Vietnam
Lê Chi Quang is a lawyer and computer teacher who has written several essays criticizing the government. These essays were distributed through the Internet. More
Aung San Suu Kyi | Status: Released | Myanmar
Aung San Suu Kyi is a writer and pro-democracy activist and daughter of Burma’s independence hero Aung San. More
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PEN America On 
Bangladesh's media industry has grown rapidly in the last decade, with new print and online media entering the market. But journalists are still deprived of professional rights that restrict their freedom to work: https://bit.ly/2LGYRw9 via @dwnews.
The Department of Justice files a new ‘statement of interest’ in an ongoing lawsuit over free speech on college campuses: https://bit.ly/35jgeeh via @thedailybeast.
LGBT activists say that Facebook ads are pushing misinformation about HIV prevention: https://wapo.st/2rzeyhN via @washingtonpost.