#Algeria : An Algerian journalist, Belkacem Djir, was sentenced Sunday by a court in Algiers to three years in prison, according to an association supporting prisoners.
“The verdict fell on the trial of detained journalist Belkacem Djir: sentencing to three years in prison,” said the National Committee for the Liberation of Detainees (CNLD) on its Facebook page.
Djir was accused of usurpation of function and blackmail. On the other hand, the accusation chamber of the Algiers court had ruled on April 22 dismissal for the accusation of attack on the morale of the army “.
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No information was available on the facts alleged against him.
Belkacem Djir, 34, was detained on July 15, 2019, a journalist for the private news TV channel Echourouk News, where he produces and presents political broadcasts.
Before his trial, his lawyer, Me Faiza Guettache, had said that Mr. Djir was “a victim of the gray areas surrounding the investigative work of journalists”. According to her, he was “in the wrong place with the wrong person” at the time of the events.
According to the NGO Reporters Without Borders (RSF), “the multiplication of the prosecutions against the Algerian journalists is extremely worrying and indicates a flagrant degradation of the freedom of the press in Algeria”.
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Several Algerian journalists are currently behind bars, including Khaled Drareni, founder of the online news site Casbah Tribune and correspondent for the French-language TV channel TV5 Monde, and Abdelkrim Zeghileche, director of an internet radio station, Radio-Sarbacane .
Like others, they are being sued for reasons related to “Hirak”, the popular anti-regime protest movement born in February 2019.
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