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Kyiv has stripped the military accreditation of a reporter with Russia’s independent Novaya Gazeta newspaper, alleging she revealed the positions of Ukrainian government troops that are fighting Russia-backed separatists in eastern Ukraine.

The AFP news agency quotes a spokeswoman for Ukraine's SBU national security service as saying the decision was made against correspondent Yulia Polukhina because she used Novaya Gazeta's website to reveal "Ukrainian soldiers’ positions on the front line."

On July 8, Novaya Gazeta published video footage of an industrial hangar purportedly used by Ukrainian snipers to fire at separatists near their de facto capital of Donetsk.

Polukhina said in the footage that she was reporting from the town of Avdiyivka just north of Donetsk.

But Novaya Gazeta denied that the buildings were firing positions, saying they were places where soldiers live -- and that Polukhina filmed the location openly and with the approval of a press officer from the Ukrainian Armed Forces.

Journalists must have special permits from both the SBU and Kyiv's military to cover the war in eastern Ukraine.

Novaya Gazeta publishes critical and investigative coverage of Russian political and social affairs, including criticism of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Based on reporting by AFP and Ukrayinska Pravda
Iranian human rights activist, Narges Mohammadi with her children, Ali (left) and Kiana (right) file photo
Iranian human rights activist, Narges Mohammadi with her children, Ali (left) and Kiana (right) file photo

The mother of jailed Iranian human rights defender Narges Mohammadi has called on President Hassan Rohani to intervene in the case of her daughter, who has been on hunger strike for two weeks.

Mohammadi, one of Iran's top rights activists, has reportedly refused to eat since June 27 to protest a refusal by prison officials to allow her to speak to her Paris-based children on the phone.

"In this country, being a mother is a crime," writes Mohammadi’s mother, Ozra Bazargan, in an open letter addressed to Rohani.

Bazargan called on Rohani to work to allow Mohammadi to speak to her 9-year-old twins.

She added that, as an Iranian citizen and a mother, she expects Rohani to intervene to so that "the life of my daughter is not endangered further.”

Amnesty International says Mohammadi suffers from several medical conditions and the hunger strike "critically endangers her health and life."

Mohammadi, the deputy head of the Defenders of Human Rights Center (DHRC), which was co-founded by Iranian Nobel Peace Prize laureate Shirin Ebadi, was recently sentenced to 16 years in prison after being convicted of charges connected to her human rights activism.

The sentence was condemned by rights groups and the UN's high commissioner for human rights Zeid Ra'ad al-Hussein.

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"Watchdog" is a blog with a singular mission -- to monitor the latest developments concerning human rights, civil society, and press freedom. We'll pay particular attention to reports concerning countries in RFE/RL's broadcast region.

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