Nigerian police criticized for threatening editor

A New York-based media rights group has called on Nigerian police to drop the threat of arrest and prosecution of the editor of a critical private weekly charged with defamation. In a statement, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) called on the police and state prosecutors "to withdraw the threat of arrest and prosecution of Mallam Tukur, the editor-in-chief and publisher of the independent weekly, Desert Herald." "We call on Nigerian authorities to cease harassing Mallam Tukur immediately and allow him to work freely without further threat of prosecution," CPJ Africa Program Coordinator Tom Rhodes said in the statement on Friday. Tukur, whose publication is based in the northern city of Kaduna, told AFP that the police arrested him on Monday and drove him to Bauchi, more than 250 miles away from Kaduna on the orders of a top regional police officer.