National security laws as a tool to gag the press: Eurasia in focus

Baris Altintas

Barış Altıntaş is the co-founder (in 2017) and current co-director of the Media and Law Studies Association, which provides pro-bono legal support to writers and journalists in Turkey who have been subjected to intimidation, surveillance, smear campaigns and legal harassment. She lives in Istanbul.

Alsu Kurmasheva

Alsu Kurmasheva is a journalist with RFE/RL’s Tatar-Bashkir Service who was detained in Kazan, Russia, on October 18, 2023. Alsu holds U.S. and Russian citizenship and lives in Prague, Czech Republic, with her husband and two daughters. Alsu traveled to Russia on May 20, 2023, to care for her elderly, ailing mother. She was temporarily detained while waiting for her return flight on June 2, 2023. Authorities at Kazan airport confiscated her U.S. and Russian passports, preventing her from leaving the country. She was subsequently fined 10,000 rubles ($103) for failure to register her U.S. passport with Russian authorities. Before she could pay this fine, she was detained again on October 18, 2023, for failing to declare herself a “foreign agent.” On December 11, 2023, Russian authorities launched a third investigation against Alsu for “spreading false information” about Russia’s military. Following a rapid and secret trial, Kurmasheva was convicted of “spreading false information” about Russia’s military on July 19, 2024, and sentenced to six and a half years in prison. Alsu’s detention was condemned by the governments of Austria, Canada, Czech Republic, France, Poland, and Sweden, two dozen U.S. lawmakers, as well as by EU, OSCE, US and UN officials. President Biden called for Alsu’s immediate release at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner on April 27, 2024. Human rights and press freedom organizations condemned Alsu’s politically-motivated detention and called for her immediate release, including  Amnesty International, the Committee to Protect Journalists, Freedom House, Memorial, PEN America, Reporters Without Borders, the International Federation of Journalists, and the International Press Institute. After more than nine months in prison, Alsu was released as part of a prisoner exchange between the United States and Russia on August 1, 2024.

Gulnoza Said

Gulnoza Said is a journalist and press freedom advocate with over 20 years of experience in New York, Prague, Bratislava, and Tashkent. At the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), she has conducted several missions to countries in Europe and Central Asia, and advocated for greater press freedom and the release of jailed journalists at forums including the U.S. Congress, the United Nations, and the OSCE. Before joining CPJ in 2016, she was a journalist and covered issues including elections, politics, media, religion, and human rights with a focus on Central Asia, Russia, and Turkey. She also worked in communications for the United Nations Secretariat and the UNDP. Her op-eds, reports, and comments have appeared in CNN, the BBC, The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Guardian, PBS, NBC, Voice of America, RFE/RL, Fergana, Eurasianet, and other outlets, and she authored the Uzbekistan chapter in a book on the study of social entrepreneurship.

Rinat Tuhvatshin

Rinat Tuhvatshin is the co-founder (in 2006) with Bektur Iskender of Kloop, an investigative and news media outlet in Kyrgyzstan. Kloop is an OCCRP member. Rinat currently lives in exile. In October 2025, a Bishkek (Kyrgyzstan) court declared the activities of Kloop Media and Tukhvatshin as ""extremist"". The Kyrgyz authorities then requested an international arrest warrant for Tukhvatshin via Interpol, but the request was rejected. Interpol's Director of Communications confirmed the request was declined because using their system for political purposes is strictly forbidden by their constitution.

Festival Internazionale del Giornalismo

Il Festival Internazionale del Giornalismo di Perugia è un evento annuale che riunisce professionisti dei media, esperti di comunicazione e appassionati di informazione da tutto il mondo. Si svolge nel centro storico di Perugia e offre conferenze, dibattiti, workshop e opportunità di networking sui temi più rilevanti del giornalismo contemporaneo.

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