The British government has dropped its proposals to tighten freedom of information legislation that would make rules more restrictive on cost limits for FOI requests and limit media access to coroners' courts and will instead investigate the idea for a freedom of expression audit for future legislation, the UK's Newspaper Society reported Thursday.

“We agree with Select Committee on Culture that a free press is a hallmark of our democracy, that there is no case for statutory regulation of the press, that self- regulation of the press should be maintained and that it is for publishers themselves to demonstrate by their decisions that they can sustain and bolster public confidence in the way information is gathered and used,” Prime Minister Gordon Brown said, according to the NS.

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Two Village Voice Media executives were arrested in Phoenix Thursday on charges that a story published earlier that day in The Phoenix New Times, owned by Village Voice, revealed grand jury secrets.

Jim Larkin, chief executive, and Michael Lacey, the executive editor, were arrested at their homes Thursday night because of an article they wrote revealing that the Village Voice Media company, its executives, reporters and names of the readers of its Web site had been subpoenaed by a special prosecutor, the New York Times reported Friday.

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A Russian Federal Security Service officer has been charged Wednesday in connection with the 2006 murder of Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya.

FSB Lt. Col. Pavel Ryaguzov has been charged with providing Politkovskaya's killers with her home address prior to her Oct. 7, 2006 slaying in her Moscow apartment building, Itar-Tass reported Wednesday, citing a source close to the investigation, United Press International stated in an article.

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The publisher of the popular weekly Uyo newspaper, Events, was arrested by security agents last week and continues to be detained, apparently because of allegations printed in the latest edition of the newspaper.

The paper, published by Jerome Imeime, contained a caption reading “Akpabio finger treasury,” which may have contained unfavourable news or allegations about the country's governor, Godswill Akpabio.

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International press freedom watchdog group Reporters Sans Frontières released Tuesday its Worldwide Press Freedom Index 2007, which measures the level of press freedom in 169 countries. The index revealed Eritrea has replaced North Korea as being in last place in the world with respect to press freedom, while Iceland claimed the number one spot as best in the world.

Online press freedom violations are playing an increasing role in affecting overall press freedom around the world, as the most oppressive governments, such as China, are finding new ways to quash freedom of speech, the index reported.

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Police in Niger are continuing to detain a journalist who ran the only newspaper in the region, which has been made unstable by a continuing rebellion against government, Voice of America news reported Friday.

No official charges have been filed against Manzo Diallo,who published Air Info. He has been transferred back to his hometown, Agadez, which is under military occupation and a government state of alert. This makes his case difficult to track, Leonard Vincent, of journalism watchdog group Reporters Sans Frontieres, told VOA.

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Internet censorship in China is becoming increasingly tight, according to a Chinese IT expert and the international journalism watchdog group Reporters Sans Frontieres.

In partnership with RSF and Chinese Human Rights Defenders, an anonymous author, who is a technician working inside a Chinese web company, has written a report detailing the expansion of China's official system of online censorship, surveillance and propaganda.

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