According to media rights organisations, six journalists in South Sudan have been arrested in connection with the distribution of footage purporting to show President Salva Kiir wetting himself.
A video released on social media in December claimed to show Mr Kiir peeing on himself while the national anthem played at a ceremony.
This week, six state broadcaster employees were detained.
The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has now demanded that they be released.
The journalists “are accused of having knowledge on how the video of the president urinating himself came out,” said Patrick Oyet, president of the South Sudan Union of Journalists.
According to the South Sudan Broadcasting Corporation, the tape was never aired.
The arrests are consistent with “a trend of security forces resorting to arbitrary detention whenever officials deem coverage unfavorable,” according to Muthoki Mumo, CPJ’s Sub-Saharan Africa representative, who has called for their unconditional release.
South Sudan’s Information Minister, Michael Makuei, told Voice of America radio that the public should wait to find out why the journalists were held.
Human rights organizations have repeatedly urged South Sudanese authorities to stop harassing and threatening journalists.
In 2011, Mr Kiir became the first President of South Sudan, Africa’s newest country.
However, the country has been through a number of catastrophes since then, including deadly combat, political unrest, natural disasters, and hunger.