Antoine Galindo’s employer, the specialist publication Africa Intelligence, denounces “false accusations” which “are not based on any tangible element”. He calls for the “immediate release” of the journalist.
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A French journalist, Antoine Galindo, has been imprisoned in Ethiopia since his arrest on February 22. The authorities accuse him of “conspire to create chaos” in the country, announced Monday, February 26, in a press release, his employer, the specialized publication Africa Intelligence. The journalist was brought before a judge on Saturday who extended his detention until March 1. The media denounces “false accusations” Who “are not based on any tangible element” and calls for “immediate release” of his journalist.
Asked by AFP about this arrest, the Ethiopian authorities did not immediately respond. Antoine Galindo, 36, head of the East Africa section, arrived in Ethiopia on February 13 to cover the African Union (AU) summit in Addis Ababa, headquarters of the pan-African organization. “Known journalist of the Ethiopian Media Authority”the media supervisory body in Ethiopia, it “had a visa authorizing him to carry out his journalistic activity”underlines Africa Intelligence, which criticizes a “unjustified arrest” component “a serious attack on press freedom”.
“A terrible context for the press”
Antoine Galindo resided in Ethiopia between 2013 and 2017, four years during which he was the correspondent for several international media. The Committee to Protect Journalists denounced “an unjust arrest” Who “illuminates the terrible context for the press in general in Ethiopia”which the NGO describes as the “second worst jailer of journalists in sub-Saharan Africa”. The second most populous country in Africa (120 million inhabitants) and a mosaic of some 80 ethno-linguistic communities, Ethiopia is undermined by several local conflicts, particularly in the two most populous regional states, Oromia and ‘Amhara.
After having largely improved when the current Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed came to power in 2018, the situation of freedom of expression and the press in Ethiopia has once again deteriorated profoundly since 2020 and the start of two years of war against the dissident authorities of the regional state of Tigray. Ethiopia has incarcerated several Ethiopian journalists and expelled several foreign journalists since 2020, but the imprisonment of a foreign journalist is a first in more than three years.
