Day of the Imprisoned Writer 2020: 5 authors you should know

Investigative journalist Paola Ugaz is currently facing a criminal defamation trial in Lima. If convicted, Ugaz could face up to three years in prison. In a 2015 book, Ugaz and a co-author exposed alleged sexual, physical and psychological abuse within a Catholic lay organization. Since then, several people with ties to the organization have filed defamation suits against Ugaz and her co-author.

Lawyer and poet Sedigheh Vasmaghi was banned from leaving Iran in 2019, only two years after returning to the country after living in Sweden for several years. She's been sentenced to prison several times for reasons tied to her reform activism. In August, she was sentenced to a year in prison for signing a petition criticizing police brutality against protesters.

Erdogan critic Osman Kavala has been imprisoned for three years. He was briefly released in February, when a court acquitted him of trying to overthrow the government with the 2013 Gezi protests. Shortly after, he was arrested again, for allegedly being involved in the 2016 coup attempt. Last year, the European Court of Human Rights ruled that his initial arrest had been politically motivated.

Uighur poet and editor Chimengul Awut was sent to a "re-education" camp in July 2018, according to local media and human rights organizations. Awut worked for a state-owned publishing house and edited a book that Chinese leadership allegedly disliked. Millions of Uighurs, an ethnic minority living mainly in the province of Xinjiang, have been put into detention camps by China's government.

Kakwenza Rukirabashaija's novel "The Greedy Barbarian" is seen as critical of the Ugandan president and his family. The journalist and activist was arrested in September 2020 and detained for several days. Accused of "inciting violence and encouraging sectarianism," he is currently free on bail, according to PEN, but has to check in with authorities over 200 kilometers from his home every week.