ALGERIA
Flag mockery costs Algerian his freedom (1996)
Ironically, on July 4, 1996, when Americans celebrated the birth of their
democracy, in Algiers, authorities smothered free speech by suspending La
Tribune, the main French-language newspaper. They closed the editorial
office because of a cartoon drawn by Lamari Chawki, who had mocked
the country's flag just two days earlier. The Paris based international
media watchdog Reporters without Borders protested the cartoonist's arrest
with a letter to Algerian President Liamine Zeroual. In the end, Chawki
received a three-year suspended prison term.
Chawki's crime was this joke about his country's flag:
QUESTION: IS THIS FOR THE 5TH OF JULY? (A national holiday in Algiers)
ANSWER: NO, THEY ARE JUST PUTTING OUT THE DIRTY LOUNDRY!
Comic artist forced to go underground (1995-96)
Sid Ali Malouah, considered the foremost cartoonist and comics artist
in Algeria, has incurred the wrath of the Moslem fundamentalists. Due to
several attempts on his life, he was forced to go underground.
Cartoonist murdered in Algerian freedom of expression struggle (1995)
A pattern of violence committed against the Algerian secular intelligentsia
continues as Guerrovi Brahim, cartoonist for the pro-government Algerian
daily El Moudjahid, was kidnapped on September 2nd, and found executed
near his home in a southern suburb of Algiers. He was 40 years old.
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