Press Watchdog 'Deeply Disturbed' by Iraqi Govt's Media Threat

[Robbien]

A leading U.S.-based press watchdog says it is "deeply disturbed" by a directive issued last week by the Iraqi interim government's new media commission that warned the press operating in Iraq to reflect the government's position in fighting by U.S., coalition, and Iraqi forces against insurgents.

The warning came in a statement released Thursday by the government's Higher Media Commission (HMC), which was created by interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi last summer and is headed by a senior member of Allawi's Iraqi National Accord (INA) party, Ibrahim Janabi, a former intelligence agent for ousted President Saddam Hussein's Ba'ath Party. Citing the 60-day state of emergency declared by Allawi on the eve of the U.S. offensive against insurgents in Fallujah, the HMC directive said news media must differentiate between "innocent citizens" of the city and the insurgents.

It warned that journalists should not attach "patriotic descriptions to groups of killers and criminals," and urged the 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."


"You must be precise and objective in handling news and information," according to the statement, which was reported by Associated Press and Reuters. "We hope you comply … otherwise we regret we will be forced take all the legal measures to guarantee higher national interests," it said, without elaboration.

http://www.antiwar.com/lobe/?articleid=3985

[still_one]

1. Screw the US press, where were they for the last four years

[amber dog democrat]

5. What are they doing to anger the Iraqi puppet regime ?

We only get censored drivel here from the domestic news services - as a rule.

[Nikepallas]

2. Sounds more like a order from Bush

[JPace]

3. It's more of the bush freedom being forced on Iraqi's

a free press as long as it prints pro American interests.

[gatorboy]

4. Isn't this why the US took control of the hospital in Falluja?

To keep anyone from getting a good look at what sort of hell the civilians are going through with us there?

[alfredo]

8. Do you really think they would allow civilians

in that hospital. It was for our soldiers, nobody else. Let the kids die on the streets, unless they find a read cute one they can use for propaganda purposes.

[sidpleasant]

10. We didn't need their hospital, we have our own

A relative of mine is an officer in a field hospital unit in the "Sunni Triangle"; he reports that they've been very very busy the last 2 weeks. Seriously wounded soldiers are flown to hospitals outside Iraq. I doubt that the US military would consider an Iraqi civilian hospital to be of high enough standarsd for our troops anyway. No, we siezed the hospital so the doctors couldn't report civilian death counts to the press like they did in the first Fallujah assault in the spring.

[jrthin]

6. Those who live in glass

houses shouldn't be throwing stones. Have they taken a look into what's going on with the US corporate media?

[DeadManInc]

7. Allawi

Who told him he was allowed to bark without Shrub pulling his chain? Puppets don't have backbones, so he shouldn't act like he has one.

[Supersedeas]

9. Content-Neutral regulation of speech--ahhhhhh, no.