MOGADISHU (Halbeeg News) – The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has called for the release Kilwe Adan Farah in Somalia’s northeastern state.
Kilwe was on Wednesday sentenced to three year in jail by a military court in Puntland state.
In a statement, the CPJ condemned the sentence by the court, saying sentencing journalist Kilwe Adan Farah to three years in prison, with neither his lawyer nor his family present, is the latest in a string of abuses committed against the journalist
“The administration of Puntland President Said Abdullahi Deni must immediately and unconditionally free Kilwe, and those officials responsible for these malicious judicial proceedings must be held to account,” said CPJ Sub-Saharan Africa Representative Muthoki Mumo.
Authorities detained Kilwe, who runs the Facebook news page Kilwe Media Inc, on December 27, 2020, and held him incommunicado for two weeks before transferring him to prison, allegedly for committing murder.
On March 3, a military court sentenced Kilwe to three months in prison, despite finding no evidence to support new anti-state and false news charges leveled against him.
He was due to be freed on March 6 to account for time served, but the Puntland attorney general appealed, saying that the charges and the verdict were not aligned.
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