A meeting between the Ethiopian Human Rights Commission and civil society organizations on transitional justice, posted by the commission on October 15, 2026. (Photo: Ethiopian Human Rights Commission via X) [file photo]
Ethiopia's national human rights body says, according to DW Amharic, that the pretrial detention of journalists by Gov't forces and demands that reporters carry permits have become the main "bottlenecks" choking press freedom.
The Ethiopian Human Rights Commission set out the findings in its annual report on the human rights situation, a 126 page document covering the Ethiopian budget year from Sene 2017 to Sene 2018, roughly June 2025 to June 2026. DW Amharic, which reviewed the report, said the commission documented by place and date incidents that "violate and narrow the right to freedom of expression and access to information."
According to DW Amharic, the commission said pretrial detention of journalists by Gov't security forces, and the practice of forcing journalists to obtain a permit before they can gather information, "have continued" as obstacles that seriously restrict the right to information.
The report did not spare private media. The first problem the commission identified, DW Amharic reported, was that "some" owners of private media in Addis Ababa force editors to air only content that reflects the wishes of funders, advertisers and other interested parties. The commission said this practice deprives the public of its right to seek and receive balanced and independent information.
The regional findings were detailed. In the South Ethiopia region, the report said, security officials were requiring journalists from state funded and foreign media to bring a permit from zone administrators before they could work in different areas. In the Central Ethiopia region, journalists working for state funded media faced threats and harassment, and local officials gave orders to stop investigative reports or to block finished reports from going on air. In Sidama and South Ethiopia, the regional councils barred private, foreign and community media from covering their sessions.
In Tigray, the commission documented security forces stopping journalists who covered political issues with questions such as "show us the photos and videos you took" and "who allowed you to report," and said this came with harassment, intimidation and beatings, as well as the seizure of cameras and other equipment, DW Amharic reported. The chief commissioner, Berhanu Adelo, referred to these problems on the day he presented the report, the broadcaster said.
DW Amharic also pointed to something the report left out. The House of Peoples' Representatives has, since late last year, invited only selected private and foreign outlets to cover its sessions, a practice that has continued under the new parliament, the broadcaster said. The commission did not mention it, and DW Amharic said a media researcher it spoke with had noticed the same gap.
Days before the report came out, Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed had laid out his Gov't's plans to parliament, on October 5. In that speech, he said the media landscape would be made to operate in a way that "respects the law, national values and interests," DW Amharic recalled. DW Amharic also reported, in its October 16 article, that the Ethiopia correspondent of the Associated Press had been arrested by police in Addis Ababa the week before after he was seen filming, held for several days and then released. DW Amharic said it had confirmed through its own sources that the Ethiopian Media Council had been suspended for several weeks, but that its efforts to get details were unsuccessful. Mereja could not independently confirm either report.
Mereja has asked the Ethiopian Human Rights Commission about its media findings, why the report does not mention the House of Peoples' Representatives' accreditation practice, and whether it has looked into the AP correspondent's detention and the Media Council suspension, and will update this story with any response.
On X, press freedom groups and Ethiopians abroad have kept the pressure on the case that most shows the problem the commission described. The Committee to Protect Journalists' Africa desk wrote on Friday that journalist Abay Zewdu was due in court "after spending more than three years behind bars on terrorism charges that could carry the death penalty if he's convicted," and said he had "refused pressure to sign an apology letter admitting wrongdoing and pledging to stop journalism." CPJ called on Ethiopian authorities "to immediately release Abay and stop criminalizing journalism."
The American Ethiopian Public Affairs Committee, a U.S. based advocacy group, posted an "urgent appeal" on Saturday asking Secretary of State Marco Rubio and the U.S. Embassy in Addis Ababa to press for Abay's release and for 28 other detainees to be freed on bail. "Journalism is not a crime. Peaceful dissent is not a crime," the group wrote. "No one should be forced to confess to secure freedom or be denied essential medical care while in detention."
Lauren Blanchard, quoting the CPJ post on Sunday, wrote that "Ethiopia's govt has gone to great lengths to control the narrative about what is happening in the country, and to silence reporting on opposition to the regime." She added that news of the insurgency in Amhara, the country's second most populous region, cuts against the Prime Minister's effort to present Ethiopia as unified. Senait Senay, an Ethiopian commentator, reshared her post.
The commission's own X account has been quieter on the media chapter. On October 15, it posted about a meeting with civil society groups to coordinate on an inclusive transitional justice process.
Other voices have added their own demands. The Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Party called for the immediate and unconditional release of what it called identity and political prisoners and asked for legal protection so that "journalists, political participants and activists" can do their work freely, DW Amharic reported.
The Danish group International Media Support said in its study on Ethiopia covering 2025 that the year "can be described as a period of widespread arrests, abductions and harassment" of media workers, and that "at least 44 journalists were abducted or detained by security forces or unknown attackers," according to DW Amharic.
Sources
- DW Amharic, Ethiopian Human Rights Commission annual report on media freedom, Tikimt 6, 2019 (October 16, 2026)
- CPJ Africa on X, October 16, 2026
- American Ethiopian Public Affairs Committee on X, October 17, 2026
- Lauren Blanchard on X, October 18, 2026
- Senait Senay on X (repost), October 18, 2026
- Ethiopian Human Rights Commission on X, October 15, 2026