As World Human Rights Day approaches, Reporters Without Borders calls on President Bashar al-Assad to respect press freedom

On the eve of World Human Rights Day (10 December), Reporters Without Borders today urged Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to end daily attacks on press freedom in his country. "Syria's economic opening-up and political modernisation will just be empty promises if the authorities continue to block development of a free and independent media," it said. "For the past three decades, state security agents have intimidated and cracked down on journalists and turned Syria into a very bleak place for the media. News is controlled by the ruling Baath Party and the government. If the authorities really want the country to rejoin the international community and improve its image, they must allow independent media to emerge," the worldwide press freedom organisation said. The latest attack on press freedom was the arrest on 2 December of Syrian-Kurdish journalist Taha Hamid in the northeastern border town of Kamishli on 2 December as he was returning from neighbouring Turkey. He was held in the army intelligence service prison in Damascus until his release on 5 December, according to human rights lawyer Anwar al-Bunni. Hamid, a journalism student at Damascus University and a 37-year-old father of four, regularly wrote political and cultural articles for Kurdish-language news websites, especially the German-based www.amude.com. He had fled to Turkey after clashes last March between Kurds, Arab tribes and Syrian security forces in Kamishli, in which many were reportedly killed, though this has not yet been confirmed by independent sources because of the regime's grip on news. Another Syrian journalist, Luai Hussein, who writes in the Lebanese press about corruption, has been banned from writing by the interior ministry. Two members of the Syrian "mukhabarat" secret police went to his home in the northwestern port town of Lattakia on 21 November and gave him a written order from the interior ministry's political security department to stop writing articles. He refused to sign the banning order. He told Reporters Without Borders by phone that he would continue to write in Lebanese newspapers, including the dailies An-Nahar and As-Safir. He said the ban was sparked by an article he wrote in An-Nahar in September about "the curse" of having a Syrian passport. Massud Hamid, a 29-year-old journalism student, has been in prison in Syria for more than 16 months. He was sentenced to three years in jail by the state security court on 10 October for "belonging to a secret organisation" and "advocating the transfer of part of Syria to another country." He was arrested on 24 July 2003 at Damascus University, a month after posting photos on www.amude.com of a peaceful demonstration by Kurds in front of the UNICEF office in Damascus. He is being held in Adra prison, near Damascus, and has reportedly been tortured. Hamid's immediate release is one of those being demanded by the Syrian "Free Political Prisoners Committee," which launched a petition on 18 November for the release of 400 political prisoners and some 200 Kurds arrested since March. The campaign will culminate with a sit-in in front of the cabinet office in Damascus on 10 December, the 56th World Human Rights Day. The Committee's leading figure, lawyer Anwar al-Bunni, deplored to Reporters Without Borders the fact that no Syrian media had dared to mention the campaign. He said other Arab and Western media had reported on it while the Syrian media had sent nobody to the Committee's 18 November press conference at which the petition was announced. "I'm not surprised since the Syrian media are slavishly obedient," he said. "It's a regime-controlled press and journalists are just civil servants more concerned about getting paid than looking for the truth. They know that anyone who steps over the set limits will be dealt with like the newspaper Addomari, which was shut down and which the authorities have still not allowed to reappear. The Committee comprises five former political prisoners: - Anwar al-Bunni, lawyer. - - Imad Shi'ha, freed a few months ago after 30 years in prison. - - Hassiba Abdrahman, a woman novelist, jailed for seven years. - Yassin Haj Saleh, a writer and journalist, who was held for 16 years. - Kamal Labwani, a medical doctor arrested in the spring of 2001, imprisoned for three years and freed in September this year. You can sign the petition in English, Arabic or French at www.togetherforsyria.org Syria, whose media has no freedom, came 155th in the third annual Reporters Without Borders worldwide index of press freedom announced in October. President al-Assad has been put on the organisation's list of 32 "predators of press freedom" around the world.