Will Yemen fall silent?

[LiberalAndProud]

It seems there is a conspiracy of events to distract the world's attention.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/mar/19/yemen-sanaa-state-emergency-troops

Security forces blanket Yemen capital to enforce state of emergency
Hundreds of soldiers set up checkpoints in Sana'a as two prominent members of ruling party resign in protest

Hundreds of soldiers moved into the streets to set up checkpoints and enforce a ban on carrying firearms in public, going so far as to check for hidden guns inside the ornamental scabbards of traditional Yemeni jambiya daggers.

Tanks were deployed for the first time in weeks of civil disturbance in which more than 70 people have been killed. With mass protests convulsing the Arab world, Yemen became the second country in the region to announce emergency rule this week. Bahrain declared martial law on Tuesday.

Defying the crackdown, the Yemeni opposition vowed to keep up its "peaceful revolution" in the state, a neighbour of Saudi Arabia and a US ally against al-Qaida.

Meanwhile, two prominent members of Yemen's ruling party resigned in protest over the killing of the protesters.

Even so, they expel journalists who would tell the story.

http://www.freemedia.at/site-services/singleview-master/5388/

Four Foreign Journalists Expelled From Yemen; Local Reporters Face Beatings
Despite New Press Law, Attempts to Stop Coverage Continue
By Naomi Hunt, Press Freedom Adviser

Four journalists from the United States and the United Kingdom were expelled from Yemen yesterday, news reports said, as attacks on foreign and local journalists covering the anti-regime protests in Yemen continue, according to IPI research.

Yemeni security forces raided the journalists’ apartment early on Monday 14 March, and deported them from the country, news reports said. The reporters were among the few foreign journalists in Yemen, as the country stopped issuing journalist visas when protests inspired by the uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt began earlier this year.

The deportations are part of what appears to be a concerted effort to keep reports of the escalating violence between protestors and government forces in the capital, Sanaa, industrial center Taiz and the southern coastal city of Aden out of the news. In the capital, police have raided the buildings surrounding Change Square – epicentre of the protests – in an effort to find cameras and stop journalists recording events from there, Sadeq Al-Wesabi of the Yemen Times told IPI by phone today.

And if they are not expelled, they are killed.

http://www.freemedia.at/singleview/5395/

Yemeni Journalist Killed in Shootings on Protestors
"It is unacceptable that journalists be made to pay with their lives," says IPI
By Naomi Hunt

At least one journalist was killed when Yemeni security forces opened fire on protestors in the capital Sanaa today, according to news reports and local journalists.

Jamal Ahmed al-Sharabi was shot while covering the violent crackdown on Change Square for Al-Masdar independent newspaper, Yemeni Journalists Syndicate spokesperson Thuraya Dammaj told IPI by email today.

Al-Sharabi was also a member of the group Journalists for Change, reports say, and worked in media management at the Supreme Committee for Elections and Referendum, according to Dammaj.

The Yemeni government has come under heavy criticism for the use of live ammunition against peaceful protestors; reports say that at least 30 people, including children, were killed and many more wounded.

Oppression can only survive through silence.

[LiberalAndProud]

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