{"id":183659,"date":"2015-01-15T14:45:00","date_gmt":"2015-01-15T14:45:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dabangasudan.preview.websight.nl\/sudan-security-summons-el-midan-s-editor-in-chief\/"},"modified":"2015-01-15T14:45:00","modified_gmt":"2015-01-15T14:45:00","slug":"sudan-security-summons-el-midan-s-editor-in-chief","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.dabangasudan.org\/en\/all-news\/article\/sudan-security-summons-el-midan-s-editor-in-chief","title":{"rendered":"Sudan security summons El Midan’s editor-in-chief"},"content":{"rendered":"

The editor-in-chief of El Midan<\/em> newspaper, issued by the Sudanese Communist Party (SCP), was summoned by the Sudan state security in Khartoum on Wednesday.<\/p>\n

Madeeha Abdallah had to wait for hours at the office of the security’s prosecutor, before she was interrogated. She was released on bail on Wednesday evening.<\/p>\n

The security apparatus had filed a complaint against the newspaper, after it had published an interview on 28 December, with Abdelaziz El Hilu, Military Chief of Staff of the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-North (SPLM-N).<\/p>\n

In the interview, El Hilu had expressed SPLM-N’s solidarity with the protesters in Lagawa, West Kordofan state. Residents of Lagawa embarked on a sit-in mid November last year, in protest against the overall lack of basic services, such as clean drinking water, electricity, roads, health care, and education, in the state.<\/p>\n

In response to the publication, as it now appeared, security officers confiscated El Midan<\/em>’s print-runs five times between 1 and 11 January. They refrained from explaining the reason at the time.<\/p>\n

The SCP stated that it will continue publishing the newspaper “in spite of all the obstacles and barriers”.<\/p>\n

Other journalists questioned<\/strong><\/p>\n

On Monday morning, the prosecution of the National Press and Publications Office summoned five journalists to its office in Khartoum III, after the Zakat (Islamic alms) Chamber had filed a complaint against them, under Article 159 of the Criminal Code concerning defamation.<\/p>\n

The prosecutor questioned Omar Sika of El Jareeda <\/em>newspaper,  Salma Adam of El Khartoum<\/em>, Musira Shebeili of Akhir Lahza<\/em>, Ali El Beseiri of El Intibaha<\/em>, and Abdelrahman Seifeldin Aidaroos, working for El Dar <\/em>daily, for about an hour about a news item published in their newspapers on 8 December 2014.<\/p>\n

During the past two months, agents of the National Intelligence and Security Service (NISS) confiscated more than 27 print-runs of various newspapers in Khartoum.<\/p>\n

“The purpose of confiscating the print-runs is to exhaust the newspapers financially,” the editor-in-chief of El Jareeda <\/em>newspaper commented to Dabanga in July 2014. “It is in fact a direct and methodical liquidation, meant to kill the independent press.”<\/p>\n

According to the 2014 World Press Freedom Index, monitored by Reporters Without Borders, Sudan rates within the bottom 10 of the 180 countries surveyed.<\/p>\n