[Media-watch] Media Watchdog deplores Iraq govt threat - ABC News - 13/11/2004

[Julie-ann Davies]

CPJ bulletin and image of original document available here:
http://www.cpj.org/news/2004/Iraq12nov04na.html
Julie-ann
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http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200411/s1242890.htm


Last Update: Saturday, November 13, 2004. 4:47pm (AEDT)
Media Watchdog deplores Iraq govt threat

The New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists has said it is deeply 
disturbed by a new directive from the Iraqi interim Government warning news 
organisations to stick to the Government line on the US-led offensive in 
Fallujah or face unspecified action.

"We are very troubled by this directive, which is an attempt to control news 
coverage through Government coercion," the committee's executive director 
Ann Cooper said in a statement.

"It damages the Government's credibility in establishing a free and 
democratic society."

Invoking a 60-day state of emergency declared by Iraq's interim government 
ahead of the assault that began on Monday, Iraq's Media High Commission 
urged media to distinguish between insurgents and ordinary residents of the 
Sunni Muslim city.

The authority, set up by the former US governor of Iraq, is intended to be 
independent of the interim Government to encourage investment in the media 
and deter state meddling after decades of strict control under Saddam 
Hussein.

The commission statement sent to Reuters on Thursday bore the letterhead of 
the Iraqi Prime Minister's office.

It said all media organisations operating in Iraq should "differentiate 
between the innocent Fallujah residents who are not targeted by military 
operations and terrorist groups that infiltrated the city and held its 
people hostage under the pretext of resistance and jihad".

It said news organisations should "guide correspondents in Fallujah ... not 
to promote unrealistic positions or project nationalist tags on terrorist 
gangs of criminals and killers".

It also asked media to "set aside space in your news coverage to make the 
position of the Iraqi government, which expresses the aspirations of most 
Iraqis, clear".

"We hope you comply ... otherwise we regret we will be forced to take all 
the legal measures to guarantee higher national interests," the statement 
said, without elaborating.

The state of emergency, which covers all of Iraq except the Kurdish north, 
gives the Prime Minister extra powers to try to crush the insurgency ahead 
of elections due in January.

The media commission has not previously issued a call for media to take a 
certain line and it was not clear what provoked Thursday's statement.

Some media organisations have in the past fallen foul of Iraq's interim 
Government, which officially took over sovereignty in June.

Al Jazeera said in August it had been asked to close its Baghdad office for 
one month for backing "criminals and gangsters" by airing parts of 
videotapes from groups claiming to have seized or killed foreign hostages.

A month later it said that ban had been extended indefinitely.

Until Saddam's fall last year, an Information Ministry ran a state news 
agency, radio and television, its employees staffed the newspapers, and its 
"minders" kept foreign journalists on a tight rein.

Newspapers, magazines and radio stations have mushroomed since Saddam's fall 
and operate without any official license.