Indian journalist Rana Ayyub receives rape, death threats

Indian authorities must immediately conduct a swift and thorough investigation into threats made to Mumbai-based Washington Post columnist and freelance journalist Rana Ayyub, the Committee to Protect Journalists said Thursday.

Rana Ayyub, a Washington Post columnist and freelance journalist living in Mumbai, said she began receiving threats on Twitter after tweeting criticism of Saudi Arabia's role in the ongoing Yemen war on January 22.

The Washington Post journalist has since received more than 26,000 tweets as a response, including many rape and death threats, from social media users who have backed the Saudi government and the Indian ruling party, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which she has criticized in recent columns

The news website Scoop Beats published a video on Wednesday, which included a doctored photo of a tweet purportedly by Ayyub, which said, "I hate India and I hate Indians." Despite the fact that Scoop Beets removed the video, Ayyub she received more threats after it was published.

Ayyub filed a complaint against Scoop Beats with the Mumbai police; the complaint accuses the website of spreading false information about her and inciting threats

According to Indian critics of Ayyub, she is sympathetic to Yemeni militants who carried out a rocket attack on Saudi Arabia on December 20; the attack resulted in the deaths of two Indian nationals. Ayyub told CPJ that her criticism of the Saudi government was solely based on its role in the Yemen war.

Ayyub has suffered online harassment including being doxxed recently by an anti-Muslim app and being included in a list of women journalists who have been subjected to targeted trolling by social media users sympathetic to the BJP. 

* This article contains information sourced from CPJ.