Re: US moves to silence Iraq's most popular TV news channel

In the United Kingdom it is a serious offence to incite violence, murder and
terrorism.
Al Jazeera and Al Arabya got off very lightly in Baghdad. In the UK they
would be facing a long prison sentence.


"Abu-Alwafa" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> US moves to silence Iraq's most popular TV news channel
>
>  01 Dec 2003
>
> By Mike Head
>
> In another indication of the "freedom" and "democracy" that Washington is
> bringing to the people of Iraq, the US-appointed Iraqi Governing Council
> (IGC) shut down the Baghdad bureau of the country's most watched
television
> news channel on November 24. Without warning, more than 20 police and
> Interior Ministry officials arrived at the Al Arabiya facility, ordered
its
> closure and seized its broadcasting equipment "until further notice".
>
> The official pretext for the closure was Al Arabiya's November 16
broadcast
> of an audiotape purported to carry the voice of ousted Iraqi president
> Saddam Hussein. The tape urged the Iraqi people to wage war against US-led
> coalition troops and their Iraqi collaborators, calling armed attacks a
> legitimate and patriotic duty.
>
> Jalal Talabani, the Kurdish politician who currently holds the IGC's
> rotating presidency, accused Al Arabiya of "inciting murder because it's
> calling for killings through the voice of Saddam Hussein". He declared
that
> the network would be banned from working in Iraq for "a certain time",
which
> he did not specify. Talabani threatened to launch prosecutions under the
> Coalition Provisional Authority's Order Number 14 on "Prohibited Media
> Activity", which provides for jail terms of up to one year, heavy fines
and
> permanent confiscation of premises and property.
>
> Talabani later announced that the IGC had launched a "comprehensive"
> anti-terror plan, including "military and defensive measures", and that a
> nationwide media campaign would be launched next month.
>
> The police action, which the US State Department immediately endorsed, was
> clearly orchestrated from Washington. It came three days after US Defence
> Secretary Donald Rumsfeld denounced the Dubai-based channel, together with
> its main competitor, Al Jazeera, as "violently anti-coalition".
>
> After the ban was imposed, Rumsfeld stepped up his rhetoric, claiming to
> have seen "scraps of information" that suggested Al Arabiya and Al Jazeera
> were collaborating with terrorists. While saying the information was still
> being investigated, he insinuated that reporters from the two networks had
> an uncanny knack for showing up "before and during" attacks on US
coalition
> forces.
>
> Al Arabiya's news editor and journalists strongly protested that their
> channel was being victimised, pointing out that the audiotape was
broadcast
> from Dubai, not Baghdad, and that other networks had also played the tape.
> "What we have done is not more than broadcasting what we think is
important
> news," Al Arabiya news director Salah Negm insisted. "Our job as
journalists
> is not to ignore the existence of Saddam Hussein or Osama bin Laden or
> whoever. We can bury our heads in the sand and say, 'They don't exist.'
But,
> actually, they do exist. People want to know the news."
>
> Al-Arabiya's Baghdad bureau chief, Wehad Yacoub, said he and 50 other
Iraqi
> employees were bewildered by the IGC's order to shut down. "It is not
fair.
> We did not break any law. This bureau is part of the company so they are
> punishing us because our company has broadcast that tape. We are all
> disappointed and we are now jobless."
>
> Al Arabiya said it was told that the IGC would reconsider the ban only if
it
> and its employees gave written undertakings not to promote violence.
Facing
> a mounting insurgency, the US-led occupying forces have apparently decided
> to escalate a long-running series of reprisals and threats against Al
> Arabiya, Al Jazeera and any other media outlet that does not function as
an
> uncritical mouthpiece of the military occupation.
>
> Since April, US Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz and other
officials
> have been vitriolic in denouncing both Al Arabiya and Al Jazeera, claiming
> that simply by reporting the daily attacks on coalition troops and the
> growing tally of US casualties, they have "spread hatred", "slanted the
>  news" and "endangered the lives of American troops".
>
> The attacks on Al Jazeera began in Afghanistan in 2001, where US forces
> bombed its offices. In April this year, American missiles destroyed its
> Baghdad offices, killing a senior reporter. During July, its journalists
> were subjected to strafing, death threats, arrests and the confiscation of
> material.
>
> In August, US officials attacked as "irresponsible in the extreme" Al
> Arabiya's decision to broadcast pictures of masked men who threatened to
> kill members of the IGC. In September, Al Arabiya and Al Jazeera were
barred
> for two weeks from covering the Governing Council's media conferences or
> entering Provisional Coalition Authority ministries.
>
> Al Arabiya was launched nine months ago by the Saudi-controlled satellite
TV
> network MBC, Lebanon's Hariri Group and other investors from Saudi Arabia,
> Kuwait and the Gulf States. It was established to compete directly with
the
> Qatar-based Al Jazeera, which Washington has long sought to silence.
Because
> Al Arabiya has also refused to merely parrot the Bush administration's
line,
> it has attracted a substantial audience throughout the Middle East and in
> Iraq itself.
>
> A US State Department poll in seven Iraqi cities in October found that
among
> residents with satellite dishes (an estimated one-third of the
population),
> 37 percent named Al Arabiya as their preferred news source, followed by Al
> Jazeera (26 percent), with the US-run Iraqi Media Network, now renamed Al
> Iraqiyah, well behind on 12 percent.
>
> Media freedom suppressed
>
> International journalists' organisations condemned the Al Arabiya closure.

> Reporters Without Borders secretary-general Robert Ménard said: "Iraq's
new
> authorities should not try to get a news organisation to change its
> editorial line by using force-such methods belong to the past and are
> contrary to the promises of democracy made to the Iraqi people."
>
> The International Federation of Journalists called it political
censorship.
> IFJ general secretary Aidan White said: "It looks as though Arab media
> trying to report on the Iraq situation from an objective viewpoint are
being
> targeted because they are broadcasting a message the US does not want to
> hear. That will not win the peace or the confidence of the Arab community
> either inside Iraq or in the region."
>
> The New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists said it "raises deep
> concerns about the future direction of press freedoms in Iraq".
>
> The anti-democratic regulations used against Al Arabiya-the Coalition
> Provisional Authority's Order Number 14-were imposed in June as attacks on
> coalition forces began to spread. In true Orwellian language, the order
> spoke of providing "accurate information" to the Iraqi people, cherishing
> "freedom of speech" and welcoming the emergence of a "free and
independent"
> media in Iraq. It then gave the US Administrator Paul Bremer absolute
> authority to shut down media outlets that published any material that
> "incites violence" against the occupying forces, "incites civil disorder"
or
> "advocates the return to power of the Iraqi Baath Party".
>
> Over the past seven months since the capture of Baghdad, US troops have
> already shut down the Sawt Bagdad (Voice of Baghdad) radio station,
> impounded copies of the newspaper Sadda-al-Auma, destroyed the offices of
Al
> Adala newspaper, and ransacked the Baghdad premises of Al Mustaqila
> newspaper. Numerous journalists have been killed or detained by occupation
> forces.
>
> The ban on Al Arabiya is part of a wider Washington push to smother all
> coverage of the growing resistance to its occupation. Questioned by
> reporters about the ban, US State Department spokesman Richard Boucher
said
> the IGC was trying to work with the news media to "avoid a situation where
> these media are used as a channel for incitement, for inflammatory
> statements, and for statements and actions that harm the security of
people
> who live and work in Baghdad, including the Iraqi citizens themselves".
>
> As he denounced Al Arabiya and Al Jazeera last week, Rumsfeld said he
hoped
> new satellite TV programming being developed by US authorities in Iraq
would
> help offset the "clear hostility" of the main Arabic satellite news
> channels. The new programming is expected to be up and running within a
> month, according to the chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff. Given
the
> obvious political vetting, however, it is unlikely to boost the ratings of
> the US Iraqi Media Network.
>
> The media campaign is also aimed at the American public. Last week, the
> military unveiled a new spokesman for US forces in the country, Brigadier
> General Mark Kimmitt, a higher-ranking officer with more media experience
> than those who have until now been the public face of the occupation.
>
> That followed a redesigning of the podium from which news conferences are
> held, with two large flat-screen monitors installed to carry PowerPoint
> presentations the military is using to show off operations and tout
> successes. A large, deep-blue seal representing the Coalition Provisional
> Authority hangs prominently behind the podium, with the words "Justice,
> Freedom, Liberty, Security" written around its border.
>
> But, as the clampdown on Al Arabiya demonstrates, the US-led occupation
> makes a mockery of these words. It increasingly requires arbitrary police
> raids, the suppression of press freedom and the silencing of all dissent.
>
> Source:  WSWS
>
>
>