English PEN is paying tribute to “poets at risk” this week to mark World Poetry Day on Thursday. On Monday it highlighted the plight of Cameroon poet, writer and activist Enoh Meyomesse, pictured. 

In December 2012, having already spent 13 months in prison, Meyomesse was sentenced to seven years in jail on charges that are widely believed to be politically motivated.  PEN considers his incarceration to be in violation of his right to free expression and is calling for his immediate and unconditional release. In November 2012, Meyomesse self-published a collection of poetry he had written in detention, Poème carcéral: Poésie du pénitencier de Kondengui (Les Editions de Kamerun, November 2012). You can read the collection in French here. English PEN is working on a crowd-sourced translation of the collection, from French to English. Taking inspiration from its Poems for Pussy Riot project, it will be posting translations of Meyomesse’s poems on its website, and aiming to publish e-book and print-on-demand collections later this year. You can read translations of some of Myomesse’s poems, and find out how to show support for his case here.

On Tuesday English PEN drew attention once more to the case of Pussy Riot member Maria Alyokhina. In February 2012, a group of activists from the Russian punk collective Pussy Riot performed their Punk Prayer denouncing the Russian Orthodox Church’s support for President Vladimir Putin in a Moscow cathedral. Three members of the group, including  Alyokhina, were subsequently arrested on charges of hooliganism and sentenced to two years in prison. Over a year later and in spite of an outpouring of international support, both Alyokhina and fellow Pussy Riot member Nadezhda Tolokonnikova remain detained in remote penal colonies far from Moscow and their young children.

The cases of Chinese poets Shi Tao and Liy Xiaobo were highlighted on Wednesday. Both are serving prison sentences of more than 10 years in violation of their right of free expression.  

In April 2004, during the run-up to the 15th anniversary of the military crackdown in Tiananmen Square, the Chinese government issued journalists with guidelines, advising them on how to report on events and warning them not to publish articles about pro-democracy activists returning to the country to mark the occasion. Shi Tao sent a summary of the directive to US-based website Democracy Forum. In April 2005, he was sentenced to 10 years imprisonment and two years deprivation of political rights for "revealing state secrets". Liu Xiaobo was arrested in December 2008 on the eve of the release of Charter 08, a declaration he had co-authored calling for political reform, greater human rights, and an end to one-party rule. After being in held in detention for a year he was convicted of "incitement to subversion", and sentenced to 11 years in prison.