Jan 21 (Reuters) – The number of journalists jailed worldwide declined in 2025 but remains near record highs, the Committee to Protect Journalists said in a report on Wednesday that warned about ongoing threats to press freedoms.
The group said 330 journalists were behind bars as of December 1, down from a record high of 384 reported at the end of 2024.
The report said there were 50 journalists imprisoned in China, the most of any single country, followed by Myanmar with 30 and Israel with 29. It said that all of the journalists imprisoned in Israel were Palestinian.
“Autocracies and democracies alike are locking up journalists to quash dissent and stifle independent reporting,” CPJ CEO Jodie Ginsberg said in a statement.
The report said that nearly one in five imprisoned journalists reported that they had been tortured or beaten.
The embassies for China, Myanmar and Israel in the U.S. did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
According to data available on the CPJ site as of Tuesday, 127 journalists and media workers were killed on the job in 2025.
(Reporting by Christian Martinez; Editing by Christian Schmollinger)
