At six o’clock on Tuesday morning, police officers from the French Directorate-General for Internal Security (DGSI), accompanied by a judge, searched the home of journalist Ariane Lavrilleux, who works for the investigative online media Disclose. She was then taken into custody “as part of an investigation into the compromise of national defence secrets and the revelation of information that could lead to the identification of a protected agent, opened in July 2022”.

According to AFP, a source close to the case confirmed that a judge was currently conducting these operations, “given her status as a journalist”.

The IFJ, EFJ and their French affiliates, join Disclose in denouncing the intervention of the DGSI as “another unacceptable episode of intimidation”. The federations condemn an operation that is clearly aimed at identifying the sources that made it possible to reveal France’s complicity in State crimes in Egypt.

“The French government, which has just scandalously amended the draft European EMFA regulation to legalise spying on journalists, is a sign of a policy hostile to the press and to citizens’ right of access to information. We demand the immediate release of Ariane Lavrilleux and the cancellation of any charges against her”, said EFJ General Secretary Ricardo Gutiérrez on Tuesday.

IFJ General Secretary Anthony Bellanger said: "The search of Arianne Lavrilleux's home to obtain her sources is unacceptable and constitutes a violation of the professional secrecy enshrined in Article 7 of our worldwide charter. We call on French authorities to swiftly abide by their international commmitments towards press freedom and release Ariane Lavrilleux."

Read SNJ statement here. 

Read CFDT-Journalistes statement here. 

Read SNJ CGT's statement here. 

Read SGJ-FO's statement here.