Dakar, 26 April 2024– The Burkinabe authorities should immediately lift the suspension of BBC Africa and Voice of America, and reverse the directive seeking to control local outlets’ coverage, said the Committee to Protect Journalists on Friday.
On Thursday, the Superior Council of Communication (CSC), Burkina Faso’s media regulator, suspended the British government-funded BBC Afrique and U.S. Congress-funded Voice of America from broadcasting for two weeks, according to a CSC statement andnewsreports. The CSC said the suspensions were “precautionary measures” in response to the outlets’ reporting on allegations of misconduct by the Burkinabe army, detailed in a report by the global Human Rights Watch (HRW) rights group.
The CSC also ordered internet service providers to block access to the BBC Africa and Voice of America’s websites, and asked Burkinabe media not to relay the content of the Human Rights Watch report under penalty of “sanctions provided for by the laws in force.”
“The Burkinabe authorities must immediately lift the suspension of BBC Africa and Voice of America and refrain from censoring local journalists and media outlets,” said Angela Quintal, head of CPJ’s Africa program, in New York. “The army’s conduct cannot be a taboo subject. Burkinabe citizens have the right to be informed on all matters of public interest in the military response to the security crisis in their country.”
According to the HRW report, the Burkinabe army had killed 223 civiliansin the country’s north in retaliation for attacks by armed Islamist fighters. In its statement, the CSC said the Voice of America and BBC Africa broadcasts constituted “disinformation likely to discredit the Burkinabe army.”
In an April 26 statement, Voice of America said that it “stands by its reporting” and “intends to continue to fully and fairly cover activities in the country.” A BBC spokesperson told CPJ that “the suspension reduces BBC’s ability to reach audiences with independent and accurate news” and it will continue to report on the region in the public interest and without fear or favor.
Burkina Faso is ruled by a military regime led by Ibrahim Traoré, who seized power during aSeptember 2022 coup amid an insurgency by Islamist armed groups.
All the required paperwork has been submitted to the port authority, and the cargo has been loaded and prepared for the humanitarian trip to the besieged enclave.
However, organisers received word of an “administrative roadblock” initiated by Israel in an attempt to prevent the departure.
Israel is reportedly pressuring the Republic of Guinea Bissau to withdraw its flag from the flotilla’s lead ship — Akdeniz (“Mediterranean”).
This triggered a request for an additional inspection, this one by the flag state, that delayed yesterday’s planned departure.
“This is another example of Israel obstructing the delivery of life-saving aid to the people in Gaza who face a deliberately created famine,” said a Freedom Flotilla statement.
“How many more children will die of malnutrition and dehydration because of this delay and an ongoing siege which must be broken?”
Israeli tactics
This is not the first time that Israel has used such tactics to stop Freedom Flotilla ships from sailing.
“We have overcome them before and are diligently working to overcome this latest attempt,” said the flotilla statement.
“Our vessels have already passed all required inspections and we are confident that the Akdeniz will pass this inspection provided there is no political interference.
“We expect this to be no more than a few days delay. Israel will not break our resolve to reach the people of Gaza.”
‘Freedom flotilla’ defying Israel’s Gaza blockade. Video: Al Jazeera
Al Jazeera reports that lawyers, aid workers and activists are on board the ship in preparation for efforts by the flotilla to break the Israeli air, land and sea blockade of Gaza.
About 100 media people are on board as well, hoping to provide a more global eye on what is happening in Gaza.
Chief Mandla Mandela, the grandson of former South African President Nelson Mandela, is part of the flotilla that plans to soon set off for Gaza.
“For us South Africans, the Palestinian issue has always been close and dear to our hearts,” Mandela said, noting that this grandfather had also said, “Our freedom is incomplete without the freedom of the Palestinian people.”
Palestine solidarity protesters today demonstrated at the Auckland headquarters of Television New Zealand, accusing the country’s major TV network of broadcasting “propaganda” backing Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza.
About 50 protesters targeted the main entrance to the TVNZ building near Sky Tower and also picketed a side gate entrance for media workers for about an hour.
The protest climaxed a week of critical responses from commentators and critics of TVNZ’s Q&A senior reporter/presenter Jack Tame’s 45-minute interview with Israel ambassador Ran Yaakoby last Sunday which Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa (PSNA) secretary Neil Scott described as “a platform for propaganda to excuse the genocide happening in Gaza over the last six months”.
Waving Palestine flags and placards declaring “Bias”, “silence is complicity — free Palestine,” and “Balanced journalism — my ass,” the protesters chanted “Jack Tame, you cannot hide – you’re complicit with genocide.”
Protester Joseph with a Palestine flag outside the entrance to TVNZ’s headquarters today. Image: APR
Chalked on the pavement and on the walls were slogans such as “Jack ‘Shame’ helped kill MSM”, “TVNZ stop platforming genocide and Zionism”, “TVNZ genocide apologists” and “137 journalists killed” in reference to the mainly Palestinian journalists targeted by Israeli military forces.
Across the street, a wall slogan said: “TVNZ (Q&A) broadcast Israeli lies about Gaza”. Other slogans condemned the lack of Palestinian voices in TVNZ coverage – there are about 288 Palestinian people in New Zealand, according to the 2018 Census.
Ironically, TVNZ tonight screened a rare Palestinian story — a heart-rending report about the tragic death in Gaza of a baby girl, Sabreen Joudeh, “Patience” in Arabic, who had been saved from her dying mother’s womb after an Israeli air strike on their family home.
The TVNZ report interviewed the related Gouda family in Auckland hours before Abdallah Gouda, a doctor, flew out to Turkiye to join a humanitarian aid flotilla leaving for Gaza.
PSNA’s Neil Scott criticises TVNZ coverage of Gaza. Video: Café Pacific
Criticism of ‘complicity’?
“Jack Tame, you’re a professional,” yelled PSNA secretary Scott through a loud hailer addressing TVNZ. “You know what would be set up, you have to know.
“But you allowed it to happen!”
“I don’t get you Jack, stupid or complicit? Complicit or stupid? One of the two.”
Critics are understood to be filing complaints about the alleged “one-sidedness” of the programme citing many specific criticisms.
“We’re here today because of Jack Tame’s Q&A report for TVNZ,” said Scott. Among some of his complaints were Tame:
interviewing Ambassador Yaakoby at the Israeli Embassy in Wellington instead of at a TVNZ studio with the New Zealand flag being showed alongside the Israeli flag. “Tying the two countries together – a professional would have had the New Zealand flag removed.”
Not providing context around the October 7 Hamas attack on southern Israel at the start of the interview – “more than 75 years of repression since 750,000 Palestinians were expelled as refugees from their homeland in the 1948 Nakba.”
Asking a series of questions that the Israeli ambassador “avoided, changed, or outright lied” in his response.
Not following up with the questions as needed.
Avoiding the questions that “would have placed the issue of the Israeli attack on Gaza” in context.
A protester holds a “Silence is complicity” placard outside TVNZ in Auckland today. Image: APR
Platform for propaganda
“Essentially, Tame gave Israel a platform for propaganda to excuse the genocide happening in Gaza over the last six months,” said Scott.
Among the contextual questions that Scott claimed Tame should have questioned Ambassador Yaakoby on were the envoy’s unchallenged claim that “1400 people had been butchered” by Hamas fighters.
“The ambassador didn’t mention that more than 350 Israeli soldiers were among those killed — at their military posts,” Scott said.
“Many of the others were aged between 18 and 40 and in the military reserves.”
Also, no mention was made of the controversial Hannibal Directive which reportedly led to the Israeli military killing many of its own countrymen and women captives as the resistance fighters retreated back to Gaza.
The controversial Q&A interview with Israeli Ambassador Ran Yaakoby. Video: TVNZ
Among other responses to TVNZ’s Q&A this week, Palestine solidarity advocate and PSNA chair John Minto declared in an open letter to TVNZ published by The Daily Blog that the programme “breached all the standards of decent journalism. In other words it was offensive, discriminatory, inaccurate and grossly unfair.”
A protester holding up a “Bias” placard outside TVNZ in Auckland today. Image: APR
‘Unchallenged lies’
“It wasn’t journalism – it was 45-minutes of uninterrupted and unchallenged Israeli lies, misinformation and previously-debunked propaganda. It was outrageous. It was despicable,” Minto wrote.
“The country which for six months has conducted genocide against the Palestinian people of Gaza was given free rein to pour streams of the most vile fabrications and misinformation against Palestinians directly into the homes of New Zealanders. And without a murmur of protest from Jack Tame.
“Even the most egregious lies such as the ‘beheaded babies’ myth were allowed to be broadcast without challenge despite this Israeli propaganda having been discredited months ago.
“The interview showed utter contempt for Palestine and Palestinians as well as New Zealanders who were assailed with this stream of racist deceits and falsehoods with Q&A as the conduit.”
Among a stream of social media comments, one person remarked “On John Tame’s YouTube channel it gained a lot of comments fairly quickly . . .
“These comments were encouraging as at least 95 percent were denouncing the interview . . . with a lot of them debunking the endless stream of blatant lies and atrocity propaganda that poured out of the Israeli ambassador’s mouth.
“Most of the posters were obviously from our country and it was a great example of how Israel’s actions have shattered its reputation with their propaganda fooling hardly anyone anymore.
“It’s a bit like a little child with chocolate all over their face denying they ate the chocolate . . . except in Israel’s case it’s civilian blood all over their face . . .
“Anyway, when I revisited the thread the comments had been purged and deleted.”
On the Q&A YouTube channel, @ZaraLomas commented: “The fact that Q&A are deleting critical comments speaks volumes about their integrity (or lack thereof), and their faith in this shocking piece of ‘journalism’.
Television New Zealand . . . under fire over its coverage of Israel’s war on Gaza. Image: APR
Journalists who report on environmental issues are encountering growing difficulties in many parts of the world, reports Reporters Without Borders.
According to the tally kept by RSF, 200 journalists have been subjected to threats and physical violence, including murder, in the past 10 years because they were working on stories linked to the environment.
Twenty four were murdered in Latin America and Asia — including the Pacific, which makes these two regions the most dangerous ones for environmental reporters.
From restrictions on access to information and gag suits to physical attacks, the work of environmental journalists and their safety are increasingly threatened.
RSF has denounced the obstacles to the right to information about ecological and climate issues and calls on all countries to recognise the vital nature of the work of environmental journalists, and to guarantee their safety.
Nearly half of the journalists killed in India in the past 10 years — 13 of 28 — were working on environmental stories that often also involved corruption and organised crime, especially the so-called “sand mafia,” which illegally excavates millions of tons of this precious resource for the construction industry.
Amazon deforestation
Journalists covering the challenges of deforestation in the Amazon are also constantly subjected to threats and harassment that prevent them from working freely.
The scale of the problem was highlighted in 2022 by the murder of Dom Phillips, a British reporter specialised in environmental issues.
“Regarding the environmental and climate challenges we face, the freedom to cover these issues is essential,” said RSF’s editorial director Anne Bocandé.
Two Vietnamese teachers were sentenced to prison on Wednesday in separate cases for criticizing authorities on social media under vague statutes often used to stifle dissent, people with knowledge of the situation said.
They are the latest examples of how Vietnam systematically suppresses basic freedoms and civil rights.
Duong Tuan Ngoc, 39, was sentenced by the Lam Dong People’s Court to seven years in prison and three years of probation under Article 117 of the country’s Penal Code for disseminating anti-state propaganda and “smearing senior leaders” on his social media accounts.
Retired teacher Nguyen Thu Hang, 62, received a two-year sentence under Article 331 for abusing democratic freedom that violated the interests of the state, rights and the legal interests of organizations and individuals.
She was convicted by the Dong Hoi People’s Court for using personal Facebook accounts to defame a judge who had presided over the land dispute case in which she was involved. She was also accused of streaming such video clips at various provincial offices.
Under the one-party rule of the Communist Party of Vietnam, the government severely restricts rights to freedom of expression, religion, association, peaceful assembly and movement, according to human rights and civil society groups.
“No one should be targeted for comments made on social media criticizing the government,” Josef Benedict, a researcher covering the Asia Pacific region for the CIVICUS Monitor, told RFA via text message.
Health videos
Ngoc, jailed since July 15, 2023, was an online teacher who specialized in macrobiotic diets, which aim to avoid foods containing toxins. He used to post articles and livestream videos about education, health and social issues on his Facebook and YouTube pages.
Police in Lam Dong province in southern Vietnam summoned him and his wife, Bui Thanh Diem Ngoc, on July 10, 2023, to question them about anonymous reports that Ngoc used his Facebook account to sell drugs.
But after Ngoc proved he was innocent, the police initiated a new probe on the charge of distributing anti-state propaganda and arrested him five days later.
Vietnamese teacher Duong Tuan Ngoc in a video screenshot.
Authorities accused the teacher of posting and sharing articles and videos on his Facebook and YouTube accounts that mocked, defamed and criticized the government and the party’s policies, and smeared senior party and state leaders, according to notices Lam Dong Police gave to Ngoc’s family.
A relative, who requested anonymity for safety reasons, told Radio Free Asia that Ngoc’s first-instance trial, which his wife and lawyer were allowed to attend, lasted about two hours on Wednesday morning.
“The defense lawyer did not make a defense case for him but requested sentence litigation, saying that he had a clean criminal record and had performed many charity activities before his arrest,” the person said.
During the trial, Ngoc admitted to having “spoken ill of government officials” but affirmed his wish of “a multiparty and pluralistic regime and an improved political regime,” said the relative.
It appears as though Ngoc will not appeal the verdict because he wants to serve his sentence as soon as possible so he can see his family again and resume work, the person said.
‘Lip service’
Benedict from CIVICUS said Ngoc’s arrest for peaceful expression online is the latest attempt by the Vietnamese regime to stifle peaceful expression, which contravenes the country’s international human rights obligations to protect fundamental freedoms.
He expressed concern over the government’s use of Article 117, which U.N. experts have found overly broad and aimed at silencing those who seek to exercise their right to freely express their views and share information with others.
“These actions are unbecoming of a member of the U.N. Human Rights Council and shows that the government has been only merely paying lip service to human rights and has no intention of respecting and protecting them,” Benedict said.
Vietnam is a current three-year member of the Human Right Council in Geneva, Switzerland, for the 2023-25 term and will seek reelection to the body for the 2026-28 term, despite widespread rights violations.
Ngoc is well-known on social media, and his Facebook page has more than 45,000 followers with an introductory description declaring: “I have rights as a citizen. You have rights as citizens. Citizens are the rightful owners of the country.”
He has two YouTube accounts, one of which features hundreds of videos on health, medicine and life in the countryside, and has nearly 95,000 followers. His other channel has about 39,000 followers and features videos discussing politics, corruption and poor leadership in Vietnam.
Ngoc is the eighth Vietnamese activist convicted this year, and the third to be charged with disseminating “anti-state propaganda” according to an RFA tally.
Retired teacher
Meanwhile, the retired teacher, Nguyen Thu Hang, was sentenced to two years in jail for abusing democratic freedoms to infringe on the interests of the state.
Hang, a resident of Dong Hoi city in Quang Binh province in central Vietnam, previously worked at a middle school in Dong Hoi, and was arrested on Nov. 27, 2023.
Dong Hoi police’s investigation agency said Hang disagreed with a verdict handed down in a civil trial about a land-use rights dispute and a request to annul a land-use rights certificate in which she was a plaintiff.
The agency said that from March to May 2023, Hang repeatedly used her Facebook account to livestream comments on Judge Nguyen Van Ngh, posting videos of herself speaking at the headquarters of Nam Ly ward, Dong Hoi’s Department of Education and Training, and Quang Binh province’s Inspection Department.
Translated by Anna Vu for RFA Vietnamese. Edited by Roseanne Gerin and Malcolm Foster.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA Vietnamese.
Melissa Lee has been ousted from New Zealand’s coalition cabinet and stripped of the Media portfolio, and Penny Simmonds has lost the Disability Issues portfolio in a reshuffle.
Climate Change and Revenue Minister Simon Watts will take Lee’s spot in cabinet.
The changes came today five months to the day after Luxon first announced the ministerial roles and responsibilities.
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon announced the changes in a statement this afternoon.
He said Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith — currently overseas — would take over the Media and Broadcasting role, while Social Development Minister Louise Upston would pick up Disability Issues.
Repeated questions
She faced repeated questions about what the government would do about the closure of Newshub, with Labour saying she had “more than enough time” to find solutions.
She admitted the handling of the disability funding changes — which included restricting the way equipment and support services were funded — was bungled, and later apologised for it.
‘Changing circumstances’ Speaking to reporters, Luxon said the changes were about making sure the government had “the right people on the right assignment at the right time”.
“In both these cases of both these portfolios there have been significant changes and complexities added to them over the course since the ministers were allocated these responsibilities . . . there’s a lot more complexity added to these portfolios.”
He avoided saying whether either of the ministers had done anything wrong, despite multiple questions about why they deserved the demotions — particularly Lee, who had been an MP for 16 years and held the media portfolio for the National Party since 2017.
Lee’s removal from cabinet was a “recognition that there is a lower workload” and did not mean she would not return to cabinet at a later date, he said, but changes in the media industry had “moved quicker, faster, sooner and as a result I want to make sure that there is a good senior cabinet minister responsibility around the issues”.
On disability issues, he said there had been “a habit now” of cost overruns and poor financial management, but there was “innately more complexity” in both portfolios.
He was questioned over whether the ministers had requested the portfolios’ removal, and said “ultimately this was my decision”.
When asked if it was a warning shot to his caucus, he said he was just a person who “will adapt very quickly and dynamically to changing circumstances and situations”.
‘How I roll, lead’
“This is how I roll, this is how I lead . . . I appreciate this may not be the way things have been done in the past here, but expect this to happen going forward as well.”
He had spoken to the relevant ministers about the decision earlier in the morning, and it had been a “tough day” for them, he said.
“It’s understandable . . . it is disappointing if you’re the individual, but the reality is they know that they are really valued by our team, we have full confidence in them, they’re doing a good job on their other portfolios and they have important contributions to make.”
Penny Simmonds . . . “major financial issues with programmes run by the Ministry of Disabled People.” Image: RNZ/Angus Dreaver
Luxon said he had informed both his coalition partners. Asked if he would have the authority to use the same approach with them, he said “I’m the prime minister and I determine ultimately the performance of my cabinet ministers”.
He said they had a “very strong cadre” of women at the heart of the government doing good jobs.
In his earlier statement, Luxon said it had “become clear in recent months that there are significant challenges in the media sector. Similarly, we have discovered major financial issues with programmes run by the Ministry of Disabled People”.
“I have come to the view it is important to have senior cabinet ministers considering these issues.”
‘Significant synergies’
He said there were “significant synergies” between Goldsmith’s Arts, Culture and Heritage portfolio and the Media role he would be taking up.
He said he had asked Upston to pick up the disability role because Whaikaha, the Ministry of Disabled People, was a departmental agency within the Ministry of Social Development.
“This will free Penny Simmonds up to focus on the Environment portfolio and the major changes she is progressing to improve tertiary education,” he said.
Lee retains her Economic Development, Ethnic Communities and Associate ACC roles as a minister outside cabinet.
Simmonds, who remains outside cabinet, retains Environment, Tertiary Education and Skills, and Associate Social Development and Employment.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
Legislation is working its way through Congress that could result in the popular social media app TikTok being BANNED in the United States. Also, Arkansas governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders has some explaining to do about who paid for her lavish trip to this year’s Super Bowl, and so far her administration is not giving any […]
NEWSMAKERS: By Vijay Narayan, news director of FijiVillage
Blessed to be part of the University of Fiji (UniFiji) faculty to continue to teach and mentor those who want to join our noble profession, and to stand for truth and justice for the people of the country.
I was privileged to lecture a few units a week for some time and also wrote the Broadcast Journalism module for the Fiji National University when the Media and Journalism Programme started back in 2005.
Excited to do more to build our media industry for now and for many years to come. As I enter the 27th year with Communications Fiji Limited, I look forward to many great things happening in our business which is always evolving based on audience, content and technology.
It starts with the people and ends with the people.
Last week’s leaked New York Times staff directive, as to what words can and cannot be used to describe the carnage Israel is raining on Palestinians, is proof positive, since those reports are published verbatim here in New Zealand, that our understanding of the conflict is carefully managed to always reflect a pro-Israel bias.
Forget the humanity of 120,000 dead and wounded Palestinians and countless others facing famine and disease sheltering in tents or what’s left of destroyed buildings, even internationally recognised terms and phrases such as “genocide,” “occupied territory,” “ethnic cleansing” and even “refugee camps” are discouraged, along with “slaughter”, “massacre” and “carnage”.
Though such language restrictions are claimed to be in the interests of “fairness”, an earlier investigation showed that between October 7 and November 14, The Times used the word “massacre” 53 times when it referred to Israelis being killed by Palestinians and only once in reference to Palestinians being killed by Israel.
By that date, thousands of Palestinians had perished, the vast majority of whom were women and children, and most of them were killed inside their own homes, in hospitals, schools or United Nations shelters.
This carefully managed use of words is deliberate and insidious and, as Jack Tame’s interview with Israel’s ambassador on last Sunday’s Q&A programme showed, even our most experienced media people are not immune to its effects.
From his introduction, “establishing” that the genocide taking place in Gaza had its genesis in the October 7 attack by Hamas, and not in the Nakba of 1948, Jack Tame and TVNZ facilitated an almost hour-long presentation of pro-Israel propaganda, justifying its atrocities.
For its appalling lack of balance, including Tame’s obsequious allowance and nodding agreement with the Israeli ambassador’s thoroughly discredited claims of Hamas atrocities; “beheadings” “necrophilia” and for describing Israelis’ as being “butchered” (five times he used the word) while Palestinians were merely “killed”, this was a new low in our media’s record of bias when it comes to the presentation of the facts about the Palestine/Israel conflict.
In the very week that we prepare to remember the horrific sacrifices made in previous wars and even as Israel‘s genocidal slaughter of Palestinians brings us closer to World War Three than at any time since the Cuban missile crisis, that TVNZ should have, pre-recorded and so had time to edit, such a disgraceful presentation is simply appalling — and heads should roll.
Australians are being urged to stay united following the horrific events in Sydney last week, reports the ABC’s Saturday Extra programme.
Five women and one man were killed in a mass stabbing at Bondi Junction last Saturday by a man with a history of mental illness, and a nine-month-old baby baby was among the eight people wounded.
The attacker was shot by a police officer and died at the scene.
Three other unrelated knife attacks took place in Sydney this week. Only the Wakely church attack was officially described as a “terror” attack although there had been widespread media speculation.
Those attacks coupled with anger and division caused by the war on Gaza as well as the polarising impact of the Voice referendum last year and Australians are seeing their sense of community and social cohesion challenged.
The ABC has spoken to a panel of analysts about the solutions to staying united and their comments were broadcast yesterday.
The panel included Khairiah A Rahman, an intercultural communications commentator from Auckland University of Technology who is also secretary of the Asia Pacific Media Network (APMN) and a member of Muslim Media Watch.
The programme highlighted New Zealand’s experience in March 2019 when an Australian gunman entered two mosques in Christchurch and killed 51 people while they were praying.
Asked what her message had been to the New Zealand government through the Royal Commission established to look into the mass killing, Rahman replied:
“Overall, social cohesion when we think about it has got to do with the responsibility of all people and groups at all levels of society. So we can’t actually leave it to the government or the leaders, the Muslim leaders.
“At the end of the day, the media also had a hand in all of this and my research had to do with media representation of Islam and Muslims prior to the attack. One of the things I found was unfair reporting, so pretty much what you have experienced in your media reporting of Bondi.
“The route that extremists take from hate to mass murder is a proven one, and you need to report fairly and stay calm in a society.”
Interviewees:
Dr Jamal Rifi, Lebanese Muslim Community leader, Sydney
Tim Southphommasane, Australia’s former race discrimination officer
Khairiah A Rahman, intercultural communications researcher, Auckland University of Technology
As lawmakers in Washington push to ban TikTok in the United States, angry constituents are lobbing death threats at them. These threats aren’t going to change minds in Washington, and could actually make the situation much worse. Mike Papantonio & Farron Cousins discuss more. Transcript: *This transcript was generated by a third-party transcription software company, so please excuse any […]
America’s Lawyer E94: Democrats in the House have given tons of money to a group that is fighting AGAINST their own agenda – we’ll explain why this is happening. Lawmakers are now receiving death threats from angry constituents over the plan to ban TikTok in the United States, and these threats aren’t helping anything. And […]
Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey issued a civil investigative demand, a form of subpoena, to Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit Media Matters for America on March 25, 2024, for documents related to its reporting about the social platform X. A day later, Bailey filed a lawsuit in Missouri circuit court seeking to enforce his demand, according to court documents reviewed by the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker.
On Nov. 16, 2023, Media Matters published a report written by its investigative reporter Eric Hananoki that found advertisements for major brands appeared next to pro-Nazi posts on X. Following the report’s publication and a post on X by owner Elon Musk that appeared to endorse an antisemitic conspiracy theory, several major companies paused their advertising on the platform.
The report touched off a firestorm of response from X and from Republican politicians across the country. X filed a lawsuit on Nov. 20 against both Media Matters and Hananoki, alleging that they had manipulated the platform’s algorithms to produce the report’s findings in order to harm X’s relationship with advertisers. (Media Matters filed a motion to dismiss X’s suit in March 2024.)
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton also cited allegations of algorithm manipulation in a probe he initiated into “potential fraudulent activity,” issuing his own civil investigative demand on Dec. 1, 2023, that Media Matters turn over documents related to its reporting on X. Media Matters sued to block that demand and was granted a preliminary injunction against Paxton in April 2024.
Bailey opened his investigation into Media Matters on Dec. 11, 2023, alleging that it appeared to have used the “coordinated, inauthentic activity” described in X’s lawsuit “to solicit charitable donations from consumers.” He said that his office would look into whether this violated Missouri’s consumer protection laws, “including laws that prohibit nonprofit entities from soliciting funds under false pretenses.” Bailey instructed the nonprofit to preserve all records related to the case.
Three days later, Bailey announced that he and then-Louisiana Attorney General Jeff Landry (now serving as governor) had sent letters to several major companies that paused their advertising on X, including Apple, Disney, IBM and Sony, informing them of the investigation into Media Matters.
Bailey then issued a civil investigative demand similar to Paxton’s and petitioned a state court to enforce it, arguing that given Media Matters’ response to Paxton, it was unlikely to comply by his April 15 deadline.
Bailey’s demand included requests for Media Matters’ 2023 and 2024 donation records, documents associated with Hananoki’s reporting and materials “related to generating stories or content intended to cancel, deplatform, demonetize, or otherwise interfere with businesses located in Missouri, or utilized by Missouri residents,” among other records.
“My office has reason to believe Media Matters used fraud to solicit donations from Missourians in order to bully advertisers into pulling out of X, the last social media platform dedicated to free speech in America,” Bailey said in a news release. “If there has been any attempt to defraud Missourians in order to trample on their free speech rights, I will root it out and hold bad actors accountable.”
The organization has objected to Bailey’s demand in full. Media Matters President Angelo Carusone told Ars Technica, “This Missouri investigation is the latest in a transparent endeavor to squelch the First Amendment rights of researchers and reporters; it will have a chilling effect on news reporters.”
In a response to Bailey’s announcement of the suit on X, Elon Musk wrote: “Much appreciated! Media Matters is doing everything it can to undermine the First Amendment. Truly an evil organization.”
Carusone, in the Ars Technica article, countered: “Far from the free speech advocate he claims to be, Elon Musk has actually intensified his efforts to undermine free speech by enlisting Republican attorneys general across the country to initiate meritless, expensive, and harassing investigations against Media Matters in an attempt to punish critics.”
The announced closure of Television New Zealand’s last primetime current affairs programme seems to be the final nail in the coffin for New Zealand’s television credibility. Coming a day after the announcement of the closure of Newshub, it shows that Kiwis have the worst television and video media in the Western world.
Let’s compare ourselves with our mates across the ditch. Australia’s ABC TV features a nightly current affairs show called 7.30. The blurb for it reads:
“Sarah Ferguson presents Australia’s premier daily current affairs program, delivering agenda-setting public affairs journalism and interviews that hold the powerful to account. Plus political analysis from Laura Tingle.”
Clearly 7.30 is far more serious than our Seven Sharp with its fluffy stories and advertorials. The ABC also screens six weekly current affairs shows and documentaries this week. Shows like Australian Story, Four Corners and Media Watch.
But Australia has five times as many people as we do so that’s why they can afford it, right?
Ireland has five million people, like NZ, but they still have primetime current affairs. In fact, the Irish enjoy quite a lot of it. The Irish version of TVNZ is RTÉ and features a nightly current affairs show called Nationwide and three weekly current affairs programmes on serious topics.
There are several other human interest factual programmes too, on subjects like history, gardening, dance and more. It’s the same in other countries with similar populations such as Norway, Denmark, Finland and so on.
It’s true that in New Zealand, there’s still the off-peak studio politics programmes like Q+A, and current affairs in te ao Māori are well examined on Whakaata Māori. But what about the rest of NZ?
Some people might say television is dead, and everything is online now. But nearly all online current affairs videos start out as television programmes. The only exceptions are Newsroom’s video investigations with Melanie Reid, and Stuff Circuit which is now disbanded. And for younger audiences there is Re: which TVNZ is also making cuts to.
Death of current affairs TV
The death of New Zealand’s prime-time current affairs television has been a long time coming. At first it was documentaries that dwindled and then disappeared off our screens.
Other genres that are expensive to produce have also become extinct or rarer than a fairy tern — drama, science programmes, kidult, arts programmes, wildlife documentaries, chat shows. Now we can add consumer affairs and prime-time current affairs to the list.
But it doesn’t have to be this way. If other countries can do it, why not NZ?
This suggests either a lack of understanding of her role or a lack of ambition. She also let slip that there was no way she could save Newshub.
The only substantive solution to come from the minister is her promise to review the Broadcasting Act. But that review process was initiated by the Ministry for Culture and Heritage years ago and started under the Labour government.
Moreover, the Broadcasting Act does little more than lay out the rules for broadcasting complaints, election broadcasting, and establish NZ On Air, the BSA and Te Māngai Pāho.
Minister just tweaking
The minister says she is reviewing the Broadcasting Act to create a “more level playing field” and allow media businesses to “innovate”. That doesn’t sound like it will do much for television and video current affairs, which will take much more than just tweaking how NZ On Air and the BSA work.
Perhaps she intends something much more comprehensive, such as a new funding stream for public media, perhaps through a levy, a compulsory subscription, or even a licence fee.
Despite her protestations, there are several options available to the minister. To save TVNZ’s Fair Go and Sunday, she could provide TVNZ with an interim cash injection (which is actually what governments often do in disasters) until the comprehensive long-term funding is sorted out.
To save Newshub she could promise to remove advertising from TVNZ, or partially on weekends only. This would throw Warner Bros Discovery a lifeline in the form of advertisers looking for a television station to advertise on. She does not have to stand by and watch while our media burns.
Sunday is only with us for a few more weeks. Enjoy it while it lasts.
The Western corporate media is failing in its coverage of Israel’s war on Gaza, says Palestinian independent journalist Dalia Hatuqa. “A lot of what’s missing from the bigger portrait … is the Palestinian voice,” says Hatuqa, who applauds local journalists in Gaza for providing the world a crucial window into what’s happening there while international reporters are blocked by Israel from entering…
Warner Bros Discovery chief executive and Stuff publisher Sinead Boucher confirmed the arrangement at a joint news conference today.
Boucher had told her staff the company will “definitely be bringing some Newshub staff” to produce the 6pm bulletins.
She then told reporters she was unsure how many staff would be required, but it would be fewer than “40 to 50” specified in a “stripped back” proposal from Newshub’s own staff.
‘We are digital first’
“We’re not getting into the TV business. We are a digital first multimedia company building a new 6pm product for Warner Brothers,” she said.
Mediawatch understands many media companies approached WBD with proposals to provide news after the company first proposed the cost-saving closure in late February.
However, by the time of the confirmation earlier this month most of those had been rejected by WBD.
Sky TV was also reported to be in the running. It currently runs a Newshub-produced bulletin at 5:30pm each weekday on the free-to-air channel Sky Open and would require a replacement. It also had plenty of TV production facilities.
Sinead Boucher said a Sky bulletin was not included in the deal, but she hoped there would be discussions about that.
Negotiations were carried out in secret both before and after Warner Bros Discovery (WBD) confirmed the complete closure of Newshub on July 5, leaving the company with no news presence.
Stuff refused to comment during the process and Stuff journalists told RNZ Mediawatch on Monday night they were unaware of an impending announcement.
“We didn’t want to raise expectations for Newshub staff when we weren’t sure what would be required,” Boucher told reporters today, explaining that the deal had been done in haste.
Why do the deal – and what’s it worth? The money WBD is putting into the deal is confidential but it is certain to be just a fraction of the current cost of running Newshub, which would run to tens of millions of dollars a year.
WBD was clearly determined to carve that cost off the bottom line of its loss-making local operation. The financial benefit for Stuff may not be great taking the set-up and running costs into account.
WBD’s Glen Kyne said neither company would comment on specific commercial details, but when asked about the possible profit margin for Stuff, Boucher said: “Both parties are satisfied with where we have ended up.”
But while the audience for TV news bulletins is declining — and the ad revenue has fallen accordingly — it is still substantial for TVNZ 1 and Three. The “appointment viewing” time of 6pm creates a viewing peak which the TV broadcasters use to hold viewers for the entertainment or factual programmes that follow.
Former Newshub chief Hal Crawford told Mediawatch the overall audience for Three could collapse without news in the evening.
“There’s still a reason that the 1 and the 3 on remotes around the country are worn down. News is the one programme that runs 365 days a year . . . which the schedule is going to rely on to lead into prime time. So the rest of your schedule is going to dwindle. Ratings are gonna fall off and everything is going to go to pieces,” Crawford told Mediawatch.
“The loss of the newsroom represents the loss of the ability to respond to any event in real time. That is the heart and soul of a traditional TV broadcaster.”
Why Stuff? Stuff has journalists in more places around the country than any other news publisher.
Stuff’s publisher Sinead Boucher recently told a parliamentary committee it had journalists in 19 locations, even after years of cuts and successive retrenchments.
“We have replatformed our business and have new ways of working. We look at this as starting this bulletin afresh rather than using the broadcast-heavy technology of today,” she told reporters at today’s news conference.
It also has audio and video production facilities at some sites and some senior journalists with TV reporting and presenting experience, such as former Newshub political editor Tova O’Brien, former TV3 current affairs reporter Paula Penfold and senior journalist Andrea Vance.
But Stuff video ventures have not endured. It launched its own free online video platformPlay Stuff in mid-2019. It also hired key former TV3 current affairs staff for its own longform video productions but disbanded the Stuff Circuit team earlier this year.
When the Stuff app and website were refreshed recently, short vertical videos were added as a feature, called Stuff Shorts.
Stuff’s weakness has in the past been a dependence on newspaper advertising. It was only last year that Stuff launched its first paywalls for online news for three of its mastheads.
Stuff’s main rival NZME has half the country’s radio networks in addition to newsrooms supplying its newspapers and websites. NZME’s New Zealand Herald has been getting revenue from “premium content” digital subscriptions for four years.
After Boucher acquired Stuff in 2020, Stuff embarked on a digital transition creating more digital audio and video content. It has hired executives from multimedia companies such as Nadia Tolich (ex-NZME now Stuff Digital managing director) and former NZME digital leader Laura Maxwell, now Stuff’s chief executive.
The state of Florida has passed a major new law that limits social media use for children, banning popular apps for anyone under the age of 14. But can this law stand up in court? Mike Papantonio & Farron Cousins discuss more. Transcript: *This transcript was generated by a third-party transcription software company, so please excuse any typos. Mike […]
This week the two biggest TV broadcasters in Aotearoa New Zealand confirmed plans to cut news programmes by midyear – and the jobs of a significant proportion of this country’s journalists.
Many observers said this had been coming but few seemed to have a plan for it, including the government.
Mediawatch looks at what viewers will lose, efforts to resist the cuts and talks to the news chief at Newshub which is set to close completely.
By Colin Peacock, RNZ Mediawatch presenter
On the AM show last Wednesday, newsreader Nicky Styris suffered a frog in the throat at the wrong time.
Host Melissa Chan Green took over her bulletin while Styris quickly recovered. Minutes later Styris had to take the place of no-show panel guest Paula Bennett.
Just before that, viewers saw co-host Lloyd Burr on his knees fixing the studio flat-pack furniture with a drill.
Three hours later they were at an all-staff meeting at which executives from offshore owner Warner Bros Discovery (WBD) confirmed the complete closure of Newshub by midyear.
On TVNZ’s Midday news soon after, reporter Kim Baker-Wilson was live from the scene of the announcement of Newshub’s demise.
The previous day the roles were reversed, with Newshub’s Simon Shepherd outside TVNZ’s building reporting TVNZ’s Midday had been scrapped, along with the late news Tonight and Fair Go.
On Wednesday TVNZ also confirmed flagship current affairs show Sunday will cease next month.
So as things stand, it’s the end of the line for all news bulletins on TVNZ other than 1 News at 6, though the news-like shows Breakfast and Seven Sharp survive because they accommodate lucrative sponsored content (“activations” in the ad business) as well as ads.
And TV channel Three will be entirely news-free for the first time in its 35-year history.
Senior journalists led by investigations editor Michael Morrah presented a proposal for a stripped-back and shortened news bulletin to keep the Newshub name alive (and some jobs) but while WBD took it seriously, it eventually turned the idea down.
Another media player to fill the Newshub void? There have been rumours and reports that other media companies were talking to WBD about filling the Newshub at 6 news void.
Initially light-on-detail reports of lifelines suggested a possible sale of Newshub to another media company. Then there were reports of other media companies pitching to make news for WBD on a much-reduced budget.
Among the names mentioned in media despatches was NZME, which has radio and video studios and journalists around the country, though most of them are north of Taupo.
NZME told Stuff “it was not currently part of the process”.
However when Stuff itself reported on Wednesday that Stuff was “understood to be a likely contender,” a spokesperson for Stuff declined to comment to Stuff’s reporter on whether Stuff had been in talks with WBD — or not.
RNZ said it wasn’t in the frame for this. (It recently killed off the video version of its only daily news show with pictures, Checkpoint).
Sky TV has production facilities galore and its free-to-air TV channel Sky Open currently runs a Newshub-made news bulletin at 5:30 each weekday. Sky has only said it was an “interesting idea” — or words to that effect.
“At this point there is no deal,” WBD local boss Glen Kyne told reporters after confirming the closure of Newshub on Wednesday.
Kyne also said the company’s “door has been open to all internal and external feedback and ideas, and we will continue to be”.
But anyone opening that door clearly isn’t willing to do it in daylight — or tell the rest of the media about it.
Lifelines likely?
Senior journalists led by investigations editor Michael Morrah presented a proposal for a stripped-back and shortened news bulletin to keep the Newshub name alive. Image: RNZ/Marika Khabazi
If there is to be any kind of “Newshub-lite” lifeline, a key question is: what is WBD prepared to pay for the programme?
Presumably not much, given that they said they had no choice but to carve the cost of Newshub — amounting to tens of millions a year — from its bottom line in line with its reducing revenue.
So is it worth any major media company’s while to commit to making news in video for another outlet? And it would have to be done in a hurry because the last Newshub bulletins screen on July 5.
When Newshub’s owners first announced they wanted to get rid of it in late February, its former chief editor Hal Crawford told Mediawatch the problem with finding a buyer was that minimum viable cost for a credible TV news operation was greater than anyone here was prepared to spend.
Longtime TV3 news boss Mark Jennings (now co-editor of Newsroom) said any substitute service on the fraction of the current budget would have another problem — TVNZ’s 1 News.
“You’re up against a sophisticated TVNZ product so viewers will have an immediate comparison. Probably that won’t be favorable for Warner Brothers,” he told RNZ.
TVNZ has its own news production problems after the cuts they confirmed this week.
“We’re proposing to establish a new long-form team within our news operation, which would continue to bring important current affairs and consumer affairs stories to Aotearoa in a different way on our digital platforms.”
TVNZ declined Mediawatch‘s request to speak to TVNZ’s news chief Phil O’Sullivan about that at this time.
Newshub’s news boss responds
Newshub news boss Richard Sutherland . . . “The so-called legacy news operations have almost done too good a job of keeping the lights on and papering over the cracks.” Image: RNZ/Marika Khabazi
One who did though is Newshub news boss Richard Sutherland — appointed as interim senior director of news at Newshub in January.
It was his second spell at Newshub, during a career in broadcast news spanning four decades at almost every significant national news outlet in the country, including RNZ, where he stepped down as head of news a year ago.
In that time he’s experienced many a financial crisis in the business — but did he see this one coming?
“The last couple of weeks has been coming for quite some time. I think that the so-called legacy news operations have almost done too good a job of keeping the lights on and papering over the cracks. And we just got to a point [the industry] couldn’t paper over the cracks any longer.
“But when you look at audience behaviour and the fall off and revenue, particularly in the advertising market, then that doesn’t surprise me that we’ve got to where we’ve got to.”
But if the audience was big, the ad revenue would be too?
“It’s certainly by no means as big as it once was simply because people have other options available to them. The cliche is that you’re not in a war with the other media, but in a war for people’s attention.”
“It’s not so much the audience has changed so much as the dynamics of the advertising market that has really changed over the last sort of 10 to 15 years. The digital advertising — and the big two main players in that space, Facebook and Google — are eating everybody’s lunch.”
TV ad income on the slide Annual advertising stats that came out this very week show media in 2023 attracted $3.36 billion across the whole of the media industry — about the same as in 2022.
But TV advertising revenue of $517 million in 2022 slumped to $443 million last year.
“That’s why what the TV industry has found is that can’t cut its costs fast enough to meet the falloff in the advertising income,” Sutherland told Mediawatch.
Digital-only ad revenue rose by $88 million in 2023 — but it’s Google and Facebook which secures the vast bulk of that.
But if this has been coming for a number of years, as Sutherland says, has there been enough planning for it?
After the closure of Newshub was mooted by its owner last month, seven of Sutherland’s colleagues led by investigations editor Michael Morrah put together a transition plan to keep Newshub on air in a few days.
Shouldn’t this sort of transition planning have been done at high levels over recent years right across the television business?
“Every media company that I’ve worked for or have observed over the last few years has been trying to innovate and get to a more sustainable level. The revenue was just collapsing far faster than anyone ever anticipated.”
“It annoys me when I hear people say older media haven’t innovated enough. We’ve done a lot of innovation. That’s pretty lazy politics to just say: ‘You need to innovate.’
“It’s also lazy politics to say, the government should just come in and bail everyone out. New Zealand Incorporated needs to have a big conversation about what it wants to do with the media and how it wants to fund it.
“For the past few years the industry has been like so many rats in a sack, fighting with each chasing a smaller and smaller amount of ad dollars. We need to get together and work out how we get ourselves collectively out of the sack,” Sutherland told Mediawatch.
Shortly before TVNZ and Newshub announced their cuts, there was a meeting of chief executives including Newshub’s owners Warner Bros Discovery to discuss a shared new service. TVNZ rejected the idea.
“But a lot has changed in the last couple of months. And I would like to think that eventually we’ll get to a point where we can actually have honest and productive conversations about what we can do to help each other as well as maintaining a degree of competition, but also realising that if we just keep fighting with each other, we’re not going to have a sustainable industry,” Sutherland said.
Would Sutherland want to work for a low-budget alternative to Newshub stave off the complete closure? And would Kiwis want such a service?
“There is a segment of the audience that appreciates a very highly produced, well-curated news bulletin every night. And there’s large numbers of people who no longer see that as part of their media diet.
“The trick is to provide options so that people can get what they want when they want it.
“It’s not really for me to say what a possible replacement for Newshub might look like. I’m well away from those negotiations.
“If we reach a stage where the media scene here withers away to nothing, there’ll be no-one to tell the stories. The media uncovers a lot of shady stuff in this country.
“And the fear of media coverage prevents people in positions of power and authority at all levels doing a lot of shady stuff. So it is important to document the ructions of the New Zealand media scene just like we do in other parts of the country.”
Minister in a corner
Broadcasting and Media Minister Melissa Lee . . . “If only I was a magician, if I could actually just snap up a solution, that would be fantastic.” Image: RNZ / Angus Dreaver
The day the axe fell at Newshub and at TVNZ, New Zealand’s screen producers’ guild Spada said “while the newsroom cuts have dominated media coverage to date, it is actually the whole production sector being impacted”.
“While TVNZ and Three aren’t giving definitive numbers at this time, Spada has calculated that we are looking at around $50 million coming out of our sector,” said president Irene Gardiner.
Spada is also asking the government to exempt screen funding agencies from the percent public spending cuts and to force the international streaming platform to support local production.
Spada called for” swift and decisive action” from the government on this.
Should they be holding their breath?
When confronted by reporters for a response to the current TV news crisis, Broadcasting Minister Melissa Lee said: “If only I was a magician, if I could actually just snap up a solution, that would be fantastic.
“But I’m not a magician, and I’m trying to find a solution to modernise the industry . . . there is a process happening.”
But the media are not expecting magic — just a plan rather than assertions of a process with no timeline.
She has repeatedly said she’s preparing policy in a paper to take to cabinet, but refused to give any details.
On RNZ’s Checkpoint, persistent and pointed questions from Lisa Owen yielded few further clues.
Newstalk ZB Drive host Heather du Plessis-Allan told Melissa Lee she was being “weird and shady” and the next morning ZB’s Mike Hosking told her she was using “buzzwords that don’t mean anything” and was doomed to fail.
Stuff’s Tova O’Brien reported that the need to consult coalition allies on policy means it can’t be progressed until after Winston Peters returns from overseas at the end of the month.
The under-wraps media policy is also not in the government’s recently-released quarterly action plan.
Meanwhile this week, our two biggest TV news broadcasters ran out of time.
Ex-minister leading resistance to cuts
E tū union negotiator Michael Wood . . . “There is a bit of a delicate dance which has to happen when media companies themselves are making these decisions. And media need to report on that.” Image: RNZ
After his unenlightening on-air interview with minister Melissa Lee on Thursday morning, Mike Hosking’s ZB listeners told him she reminded them of ministers in the last government.
Coincidentally, one of them was also one of few people who did speak out about the crisis while it was unfolding.
Michael Wood represented TVNZ journalists from the E tū union as its negotiations specialist.
E tū is now taking legal action against TVNZ, claiming it failed to abide by the conditions of their employment agreement.
Could that reverse or wind back any of the cuts TVNZ has announced?
“That does remain to be seen. The collective agreement has very clear processes around what should happen if TVNZ wants to move forward and make changes. It requires [staff members] to be involved throughout the process, and for the company to try and reach agreement with them. Our very strong view is that that hasn’t happened.”
“Staff have said: ‘Look, five years ago, we came to you and said we want to do these things with our shows to make sure they have a sustainable future to make sure that they have a strong online platform.’ And [TVNZ] frankly has not demonstrated strategy and leadership around those things.”
“These are still shows that are very, very popular. Canceling them will reduce costs, but based on TVNZ’s own information that they’ve provided, it will reduce revenue by more.”
It’s been difficult to get any media company executives or even journalists at the two companies affected by these cuts to talk about them, even off-the-record.
Wood is one of the few people who has spoken frankly to broadcasters’ executives, albeit confidentially behind closed doors.
“There is a bit of a delicate dance which has to happen when media companies themselves are making these decisions. And media need to report on that.
“So I have some sympathy, but these aren’t just individual employment issues. This is a public policy issue . . . about whether we have a functioning and vibrant Fourth Estate.”
Wood was until last year a minister in the Labour government which could have averted the TVNZ cuts.
It spent more than $16 million planning a new public media entity to replace TVNZ and RNZ with a not-for-profit public media entity — but then scrapped it weeks before it was due to begin.
“You’ve just identified one of the core things that we’ve got to deal with. TVNZ, in terms of its statutory form, is neither one thing nor the other. It has a commercial imperative and it also has some other obligations in terms of public good.
“News and current affairs should be at the heart of that — and that is something that we should be much clearer about.”
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
Security forces reinforcements were sent from France ahead of two rival marches in the capital Nouméa today, at the same time and only two streets away one from the other.
One march, called by Union Calédonienne party (a component of the pro-independence FLNKS umbrella) and its CCAT (field action group), was protesting against planned changes to the French Constitution to “unfreeze” New Caledonia’s electoral roll by allowing any citizen who has resided in New Caledonia for at least 10 years to cast their vote at local elections — for the three Provincial assemblies and the Congress.
The other march was called by pro-France parties Rassemblement and Les Loyalistes who support the change and intend to make their voices heard by French MPs.
The constitutional bill was endorsed by the French Senate on April 2.
However, as part of the required process before it is fully endorsed, the constitutional bill must follow the same process before France’s lower House, the National Assembly.
Debates are scheduled on May 13.
Then both the Senate and the National Assembly will be gathered sometime in June to give the final approval.
Making voices heard
Today, both marches also want to make their voices heard in an attempt to impress MPs before the Constitutional Bill goes further.
The pro-France march is scheduled to end at Rue de la Moselle in downtown Nouméa, two streets away from the other pro-independence march, which is planned to stop on the Place des Cocotiers (“Coconut square”).
The pro-independence rally in the heart of Nouméa today. Image: @knky987
At least 20,000 participants were estimated to take part.
Security forces reinforcements have been sent from France, with two additional squads (140) of gendarmes, French High Commissioner Louis Le Franc said yesterday.
While acknowledging the “right to demonstrate as a fundamental right”, Le Franc said it a statement it could only be exercised with “respect for public order and freedom of movement”.
“No outbreak will be tolerated” and if this was not to be the case, then “the reaction will be steadfast and those responsible will be arrested,” he warned.
Le Franc also strongly condemned recent “blockades and violence” and called for everyone’s “calm and responsibility” for a “Pacific dialogue in New Caledonia”.
CCAT spokesman Christian Téin, Arnaud Chollet-Leakava (MOI), Dominique Fochi (UC) and Sylvain Boiguivie (Dus) during a press conference on Thursday at the Union Calédonienne headquarters. Image: LNC
Tight security to avoid a clash New Caledonia’s Southern Province vice-president and member of the pro-France party Les Loyalistes, Philippe Blaise, told Radio Rythme Bleu he had been working with security forces to ensure the two opposing marches would not come close at any stage.
“It will not be a long march, because we are aware that there will be families and old people,” he said.
“But we are not disclosing the itinerary because we don’t want to give bad ideas to people who would like to come close to our march with banners and whatnot.
“There won’t be any speech either. But there will be an important security setup,” he reassured.
Earlier this week, security forces intervened to lift roadblocks set up by pro-independence militants near Nouméa, in the village of Saint-Louis, a historical pro-independence stronghold.
The clash involved about 50 security forces against militants.
Tear gas, and stones Teargas and stones were exchanged and firearm shots were also heard.
On March 28, the two opposing sides also held two marches in downtown Nouméa, with tens of thousands of participants.
No incident was reported.
The UC-revived CCAT (Field Actions Coordination Cell, cellule de coordination des actions de terrain), which is again organising today’s pro-independence march to oppose the French Constitutional change, earlier this month threatened to boycott this year’s planned provincial elections.
CCAT head Christian Tein said they were demanding that the French Constitutional amendment be withdrawn altogether, and that a “dialogue mission” be sent from Paris.
“We want to remind (France) we will be there, we’ll bother them until the end, peacefully”, he said.
“Those MPs have decided to kill the Kanak (Indigenous) people . . . this is a programmed extermination so that Kanaks become like (Australia’s) Aborigines,” he told local media.
“Anyone can cause unrest, but to stop it is another story . . . now we are on a slippery slope,” he added.
War of words, images over MPs Pro-France leader Sonia Backès, during a the March 28 demonstration, had also alluded to “causing unrest” from their side and its ability to “make noise” to ensure their voices are heard back in the French Parliament.
“The unrest, it will come from us if someone tries to step on us,” she lashed out at that rally.
“We have to make noise, because unfortunately, the key is the image,” she said.
“But this little message with the ballot box and Eloi Machoro’s picture, this is provocation.
“I am receiving death threats every day; my children too,” she told Radio Rythme Bleu.
The CCAT movement is placing a hatchet on a ballot box, recalling the Eloi Machoro protest. Image: 1ère TV screenshot APR
Hatchet and ballot box – the ghosts of 1984 During the CCAT’s press conference earlier this month, a ballot box with a hatchet embedded was on show, recalling the famous protest by pro-independence leader Eloi Machoro, who smashed a ballot box with a hatchet to signify the Kanak boycott of the elections on 18 November 1984.
The iconic act was one of the sparks that later plunged New Caledonia in a quasi civil war until the Matignon Accords in 1988. Both pro-France leader Jacques Lafleur and Lanak leader Jean-Marie Tjibaou shook hands to put an end to a stormy period since described as “the events”.
On 12 January 1985, Machoro was shot by French special forces.
The territorial elections day in New Caledonia on 18 November 1984 when Eloi Machoro smashed a ballot box in the small township of Canala. Image: RNZ/File
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
This rejected “heartfelt” letter sent to The Press this week criticising its April 6 editorial about a “turning point” in the deadly war on Gaza by Earthwise co-presenter Lois Griffiths is republished here in the public interest.
Historian Howard Zinn stressed the importance of historical background if one wants to understand today’s world. The past cannot be changed. But learning about the past makes it easier to understand the present and how to strive for a better future.
Every Gaza war article, including the [6 April 2024] Press editorial “A turning Point in Gaza”, begins with Hamas attacking Israel last October and then Israel retaliating. No historical background is needed.
Yet UN Secretary-General António Guterres said that “October 07 did not happen in a vacuum”.
Maybe, just maybe, he reads history. Maybe he is thinking of the Nakba of 1948, the regular Israel bombing campaigns with names like “Operation Cast Lead”.
If Israel has the right to retaliate, maybe Palestinians do too?
The same Press article refers to “Western media and its consumers” not being able to identify with “faceless, nameless Palestinians” .
Palestinians aren’t “faceless or nameless”. I’ve read about and seen pictures of some of the Palestinian journalists targeted. Refaat Alareer, a well-loved Gazan academic, writer, and story-teller, was targeted.
Our commitment to humanity challenges us to follow Howard Zinn’s advice and believe that another, kinder, world is possible.
Quoting Bethlehem Lutheran Pastor Munther Isaac, “Gaza today has become the moral compass of the world.”
Facilitated by ABC International Development, and conducted by veteran journalist Scott Waide, the first-of-its-kind training in Papua New Guinea aims to plug the skills gaps identified in the last 10 years, especially with news journalists.
“While we have students graduating from the University of Technology, Divine Word, the Pacific Adventist University and the University of Papua New Guinea, training gaps still remain,” Waide told Lae media after the second day of the weeklong training on Tuesday.
“And some of those gaps are very basic and shouldn’t be that way.
“With the help of ABC, this template was developed and we had to go through the training ourselves.
“A trainer, Chris Kimball, tested it on us and we suggested changes — for local context — and then we took the training and tested it on Chris and all our participants to see if it worked.”
The training includes the definition of public interest journalism, what constitutes public interest, interviewing tips and tools, writing structures, characteristics of a good journalist and the difference between proactive and reactive journalism.
“It seems very basic but if you look at it, the content is very relevant,” said Waide.
“If a person is graduating from another course, another programme in university, and then goes into news journalism; we’ll take him or her through that course and give that person a broad understanding of what news is and what journalism is.
“Particularly in Papua New Guinea, it’s about public interest journalism.
“We can talk about the big things, like politics and economics, but if there’s no understanding of why we’re doing it and why people are important in public interest journalism then that journalism actually becomes useless and worthless.”
Seven Highlands-based NBC presenters and broadcasters are also part of the training, including members of Lae media.
Some colleges in this country have decided to coddle students to the point where they no longer will hand out failing grades. Also, Google was recently forced to halt the rollout of their AI image generator, Gemini, after claims of the software’s bias against white people. Mike Papantonio is joined by Independent newspaper publisher Rick Outzen to discuss. Transcript: […]
On Friday, March 22, a video circulated of TNI (Indonesian military) soldiers torturing a civilian in Papua. In the video, the victim is submerged in a drum filled with water with his hands tied behind his back.
The victim was alternately beaten and kicked by the TNI members. The victim’s back was also slashed with a knife.
The video circulated globally quickly and was widely criticised.
Gustav Kawer from the Papua Association of Human Rights Advocates (PAHAM) condemned the incident and called for the perpetrators to be brought to justice.
This was then followed by National Human Rights Commission (Komnas HAM), Indonesian Human Rights Watch (Imparsial), the Diocese, the church and students.
Meanwhile, Cenderawasih/XVII regional military commander (Pangdam) Major-General Izak Pangemanan tried to cover up the crime by saying it was a hoax and the video was a result of “editing”.
This argument was later refuted by the TNI itself and it was proven that TNI soldiers were the ones who had committed the crime. Thirteen soldiers were arrested and accused over the torture.
The torture occurred on 3 February 2024 in Puncak Regency, Papua.
Accused of being ‘spies’
The victim who was seen in the video was Defianus Kogoya, who had been arrested along with Warinus Murib and Alianus Murib. They were arrested and accused of being “spies” for the West Papua National Liberation Army-Free Papua Organisation (TPNPB-OPM), a cheap accusation which the TNI and police were subsequently unable to prove.
Indonesia human rights: 13 soldiers arrested after torture video. Video: Al Jazeera
The three were arrested when the TNI was conducting a search in Amukia and Gome district. When Warinus was arrested, his legs were tied to a car and he was dragged for one kilometre, before finally being tortured.
Alianus, meanwhile ,was also taken to a TNI post and tortured. After several hours, they were finally handed over to a police post because there was not enough evidence to prove the TNI’s accusations.
Defianus finally fainted, while Warinus died of his injuries. Warinus’ body was cremated by the family the next day on February 4.
Defianus is still suffering and remains seriously ill. This is a TNI crime in Papua.
But that is not all. On 22 February 2022, the TNI also tortured seven children in Sinak district, Puncak. The seven children were Deson Murib, Makilon Tabuni, Pingki Wanimbo, Waiten Murib, Aton Murib, Elison Murib and Murtal Kurua.
Makilon Tabuni died as a result.
Civilians murdered, mutilated
On August 22, the TNI murdered and mutilated four civilians in Timika. They were Arnold Lokbere, Irian Nirigi, Lemaniel Nirigi and Atis Tini.
The bodies of the four were dismembered: the head, body and legs were separated into several parts, put in sacks then thrown into a river.
Six days later, soldiers from the Infantry Raider Battalion 600/Modang tortured four civilians in Mappi regency, Papua. The four were Amsal P Yimsimem, Korbinus Yamin, Lodefius Tikamtahae and Saferius Yame.
They were tortured for three hours and suffered injuries all over their bodies.
Three days later, on August 30, the TNI again tortured two civilians named Bruno Amenim Kimko and Yohanis Kanggun in Edera district, Mappi regency. Bruno Amenim died while Yohanis Kanggun suffered serious injuries.
On October 27, three children under the age of 16 were tortured by the TNI in Keerom regency. They were Rahmat Paisel, Bastian Bate and Laurents Kaung. They were tortured using chains, coils of wire and water hoses.
The atrocity occurred in the Yamanai Village, Arso II, Arso district.
On 22 February 2023, TNI personnel from the Navy post in Lantamal X1 Ilwayap tortured two civilians named Albertus Kaize and Daniel Kaize. Albertus Kaize died of his injuries. This crime occurred in Merauke regency, Papua.
95 civilians tortured
Between 2018 and 2021, Amnesty International recorded that more than 95 civilians had been tortured and killed by the TNI and the police. These crimes target indigenous Papuans, and the curve continues to rise year by year, ever since Indonesia occupied Papua in 1961.
These crimes were committed one after another without a break, and followed the same pattern. So it can be concluded that these were not the acts of rogue individuals or one or two people as the TNI argues to reduce their crimes to individual acts.
Rather, they are structural (systematic) crimes designed to subdue the Papuan nation, to stop all forms of Papuan resistance for the sake of the exploitation and theft of Papua’s natural resources.
The problems in Papua cannot be solved by increasing the number of police or soldiers. The problems in Papua must be resolved democratically.
This democratic solution must include establishing a human rights court for all perpetrators of crimes in Papua since the 1960s, and not just the perpetrators in the field, but also those responsible in the chain of command.
Only this will break the pattern of crimes that are occurring and provide justice for the Papuan people. A human rights court will also mean weakening the anti-democratic forces that exist in Indonesia and Papua — namely military(ism).
Garbage of history
A prerequisite for achieving democratisation is to eliminate the old forces, the garbage of history.
The cleaner the process is carried out, the broader and deeper the democracy that can be achieved. This also includes the demands of the Papuan people to be given the right to determine their own destiny.
This is not a task for some later day, but is the task of the Papuan people today. Nor is the task of the United Liberation Movement for West Papua (ULMWP) political elite or political activists alone, but it is the task of all Papuan people if they want to extract themselves from the crimes of the TNI and police or Indonesian colonialism.
Independence can only be gained by the struggle of the ordinary people themselves. The people must fight, the people must take to the streets, the people must build their own ranks, their own alternative political tool, and fight in an organised and guided manner.
Sharon Muller is a leading member of the Socialist Union (Perserikatan Sosialis, PS) and a member of the Socialist Study Circle (Lingkar Studi Sosialis, LSS). Arah Juang is the newspaper of the Socialist Union.
References
Gemima Harvey’s report The Human Tragedy of West Papua, 15 January 2014. This reports states that more than 500,000 West Papua people have been slaughtered by Indonesia and its actors, the TNI and police since 1961.
Veronica Koman’s chronology of torture of civilians in Papua. Posted on the Veronica Koman Facebook wall, 24 March 2024.
The future of New Zealand’s media landscape is becoming clearer by the day, with confirmation that it will no longer feature one of the country’s big two TV news networks.
Warner Bros. Discovery has revealed that all of Newshub’s operations will be shut down, effective July 5. That includes the flagship 6pm bulletin, The AM Show, and the Newshub website.
294 staff are set to lose their jobs.
It’s also been confirmed that TVNZ’s programme Sunday will be cancelled, following yesterday’s announcement that Fair Go, as well as both 1News at Midday and 1News Tonight, are being canned in their current format.
“The day the news axe fell” – a huge blow to New Zealand’s democracy. Image: Stuff screenshot APR
New Zealand’s media industry has been rocked by the bleeding obvious which is that their failed ratings system for legacy media was always more art than science.
The NZ radio ratings system is a diary that you fill in every 15 minutes — which no one ever fills in properly.
The NZ newspaper ratings are opinion polls and the NZ TV ratings system is a magical 180 boxes that limits choice to whoever had the TV remote.
When the sales rep told the advertiser that 300,000 people would read, see, hear their advert, it was based on ratings systems that were flattering but not real.
With the ruthlessness of online audience measurement, advertisers could see exactly how many people were actually seeing their adverts, and the legacy media never adapted to this new reality.
What we see now is hollowed out journalism competing against social media hate algorithms designed to generate emotional responses rather than Fourth Estate accountability.
New Zealand has NEVER had the audience size to make advertising based broadcasting feasible, that’s why it’s always required a state broadcaster — with no Fourth Estate who will hold this hard right racist climate denying beneficiary bashing government to account?
Minister missing in action
Broadcasting Minister Melissa Lee has refused to support the Fair Digital News Bargaining Bill that Labour’s former minister Willie Jackson put forward that would at least force Google and Facebook to pay for the journalism they take for free.
Lee has been utterly hopeless and missing in action here — if “Democracy dies in darkness”, National are pulling the plug.
This government doesn’t want accountability, does it?
Instagram this year switched on a new filter to smother political debate and we know actual journalism has been smothered by the social media algorithms.
I don’t think that most people who get their information from their social media feeds understand they aren’t seeing the most important journalism but are in fact seeing the most inflammatory rhetoric to keep people outraged and addicted to doom scrolling.
When Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters does his big lie that the entire mainstream media were bribed because of a funding note by NZ on Air in regards to coverage of Māori issues for the Public Interest Journalism fund — which by the way was quickly clarified by NZ on Air as not an editorial demand — he conflates and maliciously spins and NZ’s democracy suffers.
Muddled TVNZ
Television New Zealand has always come across like a muddle. It aspires to be BBC public broadcasting yet has the commercial imperatives of any Crown Owned Enterprise. If Labour had merged TVNZ and RNZ and made TVNZ 1 commercial free so that the advertising revenue could cross over to Newshub, it would have rebuilt the importance of public broadcasting while actually regulating the broken free market.
When will we get a Labour Party that actually gives a damn about public broadcasting rather than pay lip service to it?
Ultimately Newshub’s demise is a story of ruthless transnational interests and geopolitical cultural hegemony.
Corporate Hollywood soft power wants to continue its cultural dominance as the South Pacific friction continues between the United States and China.
New Zealand is an important plank for American hegemony in the South Pacific and as China and American competition heats up, Warners Bros Discovery suddenly buying a large stake in our media was always a geopolitical calculation over a commercial one.
Cultural dominance doesn’t require nor want an active journalism, so they will keep the channel open purely as a means of dominating domestic culture without any of the Fourth Estate obligations.
That bitter angry feeling you have watching Warner Bros Discovery destroy our Fourth Estate is righteous.
Social licence trashed
They bought a media outlet that has had a 35-year history of being a structural part of our media environment and dumping it trashes their social licence in this country.
That feeling of rage you have watching a multibillion transnational vandalise our environment is going to be repeated the millisecond you see the American mining interests lining up to mine conservation land with all their promises to repair anything they break.
Remember — the transnational ain’t your friend regardless of its pronouns.
That person they rolled in with the soft-glazed CEO face to do the sad, sad crying is disingenuous and condescending.
Now Warner Bros has killed Newshub off, we have no option as Kiwis but to boycott whatever is left of TV3 and water down Warner Bros remaining interests altogether.
They’ve burnt their bridges with us in New Zealand by walking away from their social contract, we should have no troubles returning the favour!
The only winners here are rightwing politicians who don’t want their counterproductive and corrupt decisions to be scrutinised.
We are a poorer and weaker democracy after these news cuts.
Why bother having a Minister of Broadcasting if all they do is fiddle while the industry burns?
Welcome to your new media future in Aotearoa New Zealand . . .
America’s Lawyer E93: The company that operated the vessel that recently destroyed a bridge in Baltimore has a history of retaliating against whistleblowers who reported unsafe working conditions aboard their boats. The state of Florida has passed a sweeping new law that restricts social media access to children under the age of 16, but the […]
A grim 48 hours for news media has resulted in many jobs being lost in the sector — as TV3 confirmed the closure of Newshub, and TVNZ announced it was going ahead with axing its current affairs flagship Sunday, consumer affairs Fair Go and two news bulletins.
About 250 jobs are being lost in the shutdown of Three’s national news service, which will close in July.
How the country’s largest daily newspaper, The New Zealand Herald, reported the news and current affairs closure plans today. NZH screenshot APR
He was among seven senior Newshub journalists who pushed back against the company’s proposal and put forward their own plan.
The proposal, led by his colleague Michael Morrah, was “radical”, “aggressive” and would have pared the news operation back to the bone, he said.
It centred on the 6pm bulletin which brought in a lot of advertising revenue, retain the website and would later build up the digital operation.
“Basically it was a cutdown radical proposal to hang on to the 6pm bulletin and find digital solutions out into the future.”
While management gave them access to figures and helped them in other ways they ultimately decided not to go ahead.
Newshub journalist Paddy Gower . . . “It’s gonna be a dark time for news in this country.” Image: RNZ/Nick Monro
He said when the closure was confirmed, there was a feeling of “the weight of history” at the loss of a taonga which Kiwis would miss when it disappeared.
“It’s gonna be a dark time for news in this country,” he said.
Gower said Warner Bros Discovery would have “a helluva time” keeping viewers without Newshub providing news and current affairs.
“We tried. That’s the Kiwi way. That’s the Newshub way.”
He said another media company, such as Stuff or NZME, could now come in and further their own news brand and their reputation by saving part of a significant news operation.
They would oversee the making of a 6pm news bulletin that would be sold to Warner Bros Discovery and in the process be working with one of the world’s leading media companies.
“That has to be a possibility . . . They would be seen to be saving news in New Zealand and that’s a big ups for them . . .
“The company that is able to get that deal done …. is going to get some incredible journalists on board to help them do it,” Gower said.
It would probably save about 40 to 50 jobs, he said.
Warner Brothers Discovery declined to be interviewed by Morning Report.
NZ’s Media and Communications Minister Melissa Lee . . . accused of “having no vision at all” for media. Image: RNZ/Angus Dreaver
Broadcasting Minister accused of lack of vision Former head of news at TV3 Mark Jennings believed Broadcasting Minister Melissa Lee was “all at sea” as the country veered towards a media crisis.
He found her response to the Newshub closure confusing and did not believe the cabinet paper she has been working on would provide anything beneficial.
“I think you’re likely to have three parties, New Zealand First, ACT and National, all with different points of view and I can’t see them agreeing on any forward course of action, particularly not with Melissa Lee who appears to have no vision here at all.”
Jennings said he was notsurprised the Morrah-Gower plan did not succeed, because employers had considered other options and then made up their minds before the consultation period began.
If an offer from an outside organisation did get the go-ahead, it would be a “basic product” and would be “news-light”, he said.
It might be shot on i-Phones and edited by journalists and would not resemble Newshub’s current flagship bulletin.
While both the pandemic and social media had lowered the quality threshold of what viewers might accept, it would still be compared to what TVNZ was screening.
“The challenge will be for them to hold on to their ratings and more importantly, their share. Their share has been decreasing over time and if it gets too much lower, they’ll find themselves back at square one really.”
Minister Lee was unwilling to be interviewed by Morning Report.
She said she was focused on ensuring New Zealand’s media industry was sustainable and modernised, and she was looking at reviewing the Broadcasting Act.
Lee said she had talked to international companies on how they could support and increase New Zealand screen production, but it would not include a quota.
She said it would not have helped the situation at Newshub.
Not much scope for NZ on Air
New Zealand on Air chief executive Cam Harland said the agency had a limited ability to intervene because its remit was to provide funding for a large number of audiences across a range of genres.
He heads the agency responsible for distributing public funds but its budget isn’t nearly enough to address shortfalls.
Daily television news was expensive to produce, so he considered it unlikely NZ on Air would help much, he told Morning Report.
The loss of jobs and talent was “monumental” and NZ on Air bosses intended to meet with TVNZ and Newshub as well as senior journalists, such as Jennings, to get more information before making any decisions.
“We absolutely want to help . . . so I guess our view now is: Can we be more innovative with what we’re funding, can we get more bang for the buck?”
The organisation was also faced with reviewing its spending in line with the government’s requirements for the public sector.
Union files claim against TVNZ
Michael Wood . . . “It’s an urgent matter now . . .” Image: RNZ/Angus Dreaver
The union representing journalists has filed a claim against TVNZ alleging the company breached its own consultation requirements in its job cuts process.
E Tu’s negotiation specialist, Michael Wood, said the broadcaster should have involved its employees before the proposal was presented.
Talks were continuing with the Employment Relations Authority to see if a legal case could be heard as quickly as possible.
“It’s an urgent matter now . . . We’ll be trying to get an outcome there as soon as possible and we want to see an outcome that respects the process.”
He said mediation between the parties might be a part of the process.
While the union and employees had a small victory with a handful of jobs being saved, there was still “a massive loss of capacity” with the axing of several programmes.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
Chinese authorities use drones to monitor and follow foreign journalists as they report from the country, as well as detaining, harassing and threatening them with non-renewal of their work permits if they report on topics deemed sensitive by the government, according to a new report on journalists’ working conditions.
Four out of five members who responded to the Foreign Correspondents’ Club of China annual working conditions survey said they had experienced “interference, harassment or violence” while trying to do their jobs in China during the past year, the FCCC report found.
Local governments are increasingly using technology to keep track of foreign media workers, the report found.
“During a trip to Poyang Lake, where we were reporting on the status of the Yangtze River dolphin, we were followed by multiple cars with plainclothes individuals inside,” the report quoted a journalist with a European media organization as saying.
“At one point, the plainclothes individuals appeared to use a drone when a blocked sandy road prevented them from getting closer by car,” they said.
A cameraman from Hong Kong Cable TV is restrained from photographing the crowd waiting to buy tickets for the 2008 Beijing Olympics, July 25, 2008, in Beijing, China. (Robert F. Bukaty/AP)
Another European journalist reported similar high-tech surveillance when on a reporting trip to two provinces affected by extreme weather events linked to climate change.
“We were followed by multiple carloads of plain clothes officers,” the report quoted them as saying. “Drones were sent out to follow and observe us when we got out of our vehicle to film/collect interviews. When we moved on foot to a spot, the drones would follow us.”
Respondents also told the FCCC they had reason to believe the authorities had “possibly or definitely” compromised their WeChat (81%), their phone (72%), and/or placed audio recording bugs in their office or homes, the report found.
‘Endless cat-and-mouse game’
Another journalist with a European newspaper described reporting in China as “an endless cat-and-mouse game.”
“Whatever strategy you try, the Chinese surveillance and security system adapts and closes the gap,” the report quoted them as saying. “Whatever strategies you use, the space for reporting keeps getting smaller and smaller.”
A foreign reporter of many years’ experience in China who gave only the surname Lok for fear of reprisals told RFA Cantonese that she expects her communications apps to be monitored at all times.
“I was talking about an issue with a friend here [in mainland China] … and may have mentioned it on WeChat,” Lok said. “Later, he was called in by the police to ‘drink tea’” – a euphemism for being called in for questioning.
Journalists crowd a National People’s Congress press conference a day before the opening of the annual session of China’s parliament, in Beijing’s Great Hall of the People on March 4, 2019. (Greg Baker/AFP)
“It turned out that the problem wasn’t him, but the conversation he had with me,” she said. “We have to be careful, because a lot of trouble has come from talking to people on WeChat.”
A second Hong Kong journalist who gave only the surname Wong for fear of reprisals said it used to be easier for journalists to evade official surveillance than it is now.
“The Chinese government’s digital surveillance methods are comprehensive,” Wong said. “You could describe them as a dragnet, in which every move the target makes is visible to them.”
Online surveillance
Huang Chao-nien, an assistant professor at the National Development Institute of Taiwan’s National Chengchi University, agreed, adding that the government has used online surveillance to target journalists for years.
The government has long used an internet development model that intervenes in the market to control tech companies … forcing them to cooperate with the government in carrying out political surveillance and controls on public speech, he said.
More than half of the journalists who took part in the FCCC annual survey said they had been “obstructed” at least once by police or other officials, while 45% encountered obstruction by unidentified persons, the report said.
Some had been warned not to join the club as it was deemed an “illegal organization,” while others were threatened with non-renewal of their visas and work permits if they didn’t toe the line, the report said.
Areas deemed particularly sensitive by Chinese officials were even harder to work in, it said, adding that 85% of journalists who tried to report from the far western region of Xinjiang in 2023 experienced problems.
“In Xinjiang we were followed the entire time,” the report quoted a European journalist as saying. “It was particularly unpleasant in Hotan, where we counted about half a dozen plainclothes following us by car or on foot.”
“In Korla, we at some point had six cars following us. When we did a U-turn and then a detour over an abandoned construction site and dust road, they all faithfully followed us,” the journalist said.
Chinese policemen manhandle a photographer, center, as he photographs a news event near the No. 1 Intermediate People’s Court, in Beijing Sunday, Jan. 26, 2014. (Andy Wong/AP)
And the definition of “sensitive” areas appears to be expanding.
“An increasing number of journalists encountered issues in regions bordering Russia (79%), Southeast Asian nations (43%) or in ethnically diverse regions like Inner Mongolia (68%),” the report said.
More than 80% said potential sources and interviewees had declined to be interviewed because they didn’t have prior permission from their superiors to speak to foreign media. Fear of reprisals is even being felt among experts, pundits and commentators, the report said.
“Academic sources, think tank employees and analysts either decline interviews, request anonymity, or don’t respond at all,” it quoted respondents as saying.
Translated with additional reporting by Luisetta Mudie. Edited by Malcolm Foster.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By Lee Heung Yeung and Alice Yam for RFA Cantonese.
Media commentators and Liberal ministers are angry a father filmed himself challenging Canada’s foreign minister on the street for enabling genocide. The outrage exposes the media/political establishment’s anti-democratic ethos.
Ten days ago, a man biking with his two kids saw Melanie Joly on Laurier Avenue in Montreal and asked the foreign minister to “lift the cap on the number of Palestinian refugees”. In response, Joly hit his phone and grabbed his jacket. Antoine (sole identification of the man) then told the minister to calm down and after she mentions the children with him says he’s trying to instill “good values” in them by opposing Israel’s killing. After the minister says she’s trying to have a relaxing walk Antoine says she doesn’t have that right while enabling a genocide in Gaza. Antoine then says it’s his job to harass her for promoting genocide.
Two weeks before the incident Joly made what she called a “solidarity” trip to a state the International Court of Justice found to plausibly committing genocide. In response to its mass killings in Gaza, Joly’s Global Affairs sped up the approval of weapons permits to Israel, okaying $28.5 million in arms in the two months after its onslaught on Gaza began.
A slew of commentators condemned Antoine, not Joly who may have assaulted him. They seem to believe Canada’s foreign minister can enable mass slaughter and not expect to be challenged about it. A number of the commentators demanded greater police protection for the minister even though an RCMP agent was with Joly. Radio Canada’s flagship weekly program Tout Le Monde en Parle (everyone is talking about it) played the video and had the minister on to discuss how difficult it’s been for her during the past six months.
According to the commentariat, people filming themselves challenging politicians on the street is a threat to democracy. Of course, this is an inversion of reality. While sometimes messy and unpleasant, common people questioning politicians and sharing it on social media subverts our society’s political passivity and the dominant media’s power to ‘manufacture consent’ for imperialism. Journalists with regular access to politicians rarely ask tough questions on international affairs, prioritizing ‘access’ over holding power accountable. Beyond their cozy relations with politicians, the commentariat don’t support this type of social media activism because it subverts the establishment media’s power. Over one million viewed Antoine’s interaction with Joly on my X account and hundreds of thousands more on others’ social media platforms.
Alongside media commentators, Liberal ministers came to Joly’s defence. Heritage Minister Pascale St-Onge posted on X, “As MPs, we’re here to listen to the public. It’s part of our job. There are many ways to reach us, to express yourself. But no one deserves to be harassed, followed and filmed without their consent in their private life. My heart goes out to my colleague and friend, Melanie Joly.”
Leaving aside her “my heart goes out” hyperbole, St-Onge is a hypocrite. Three days later St-Onge and her staff cancelled a press conference, hid in a room for half an hour, called the police and ultimately fled out a backdoor to avoid a simple question about her government backing a holocaust in Gaza. When I arrived a few minutes late to a press conference with St-Onge a TVA cameraman was waiting in the room and the minister was touring a public housing project. The press people asked my name and then what I was planning to ask the minister about (which was the Heritage Minister’s silence on Israel destroying 40 UNESCO sites and killing 100 journalists in Gaza). Five minutes later they asked me to leave. I refused. Subsequently, they said the minister would not return to conclude the press conference so I found St-Onge. To avoid appearing on camera she hid inside an apartment for nearly half an hour while her attaché called the police and the manager of the facility to ask me to leave. As the police talked to me, the minister fled out a side door.
Hours after releasing a sanctimonious statement about the appropriate place to ask politicians questions, St-Onge went to embarrassing lengths to avoid taking my question at a press conference!
I already knew St-Onge’s ‘there’s a right time to communicate with politicians’ rhetoric was hogwash. A year ago I attended a press event with St-Onge and asked the then sports minister, who was pushing to bar Russian and Belarusian athletes from sports competitions, whether she felt the same way about US athletes after they invaded Iraq? She smirked and walked away.
As she left the room and waited for an elevator I asked the same question regarding Canadian athletes after the Canadian led bombing of Libya or Israeli athletes. Multiple millions viewed the clip on social media and the embarrassing encounter was picked up by a slew of major international media.
A bid to avoid a similar clip may explain why she went to such absurd lengths to elude my questioning her on camera (though after a run Media commentators and Liberal ministers are angry a father filmed himself challenging Canada’s foreign minister on the street for enabling genocide. The outrage exposes the media/political establishment’s anti-democratic ethos.
Ten days ago, a man biking with his two kids saw Melanie Joly on Laurier Avenue in Montreal and asked the foreign minister to “lift the cap on the number of Palestinian refugees”. In response, Joly hit his phone and grabbed his jacket. Antoine (sole identification of the man) then told the minister to calm down and after she mentions the children with him says he’s trying to instill “good values” in them by opposing Israel’s killing. After the minister says she’s trying to have a relaxing walk Antoine says she doesn’t have that right while enabling a genocide in Gaza. Antoine then says it’s his job to harass her for promoting genocide.
Two weeks before the incident Joly made what she called a “solidarity” trip to a state the International Court of Justice found to plausibly committing genocide. In response to its mass killings in Gaza, Joly’s Global Affairs sped up the approval of weapons permits to Israel, okaying $28.5 million in arms in the two months after its onslaught on Gaza began.
A slew of commentators condemned Antoine, not Joly who may have assaulted him. They seem to believe Canada’s foreign minister can enable mass slaughter and not expect to be challenged about it. A number of the commentators demanded greater police protection for the minister even though an RCMP agent was with Joly. Radio Canada’s flagship weekly program Tout Le Monde en Parle (everyone is talking about it) played the video and had the minister on to discuss how difficult it’s been for her during the past six months.
According to the commentariat, people filming themselves challenging politicians on the street is a threat to democracy. Of course, this is an inversion of reality. While sometimes messy and unpleasant, common people questioning politicians and sharing it on social media subverts our society’s political passivity and the dominant media’s power to ‘manufacture consent’ for imperialism. Journalists with regular access to politicians rarely ask tough questions on international affairs, prioritizing ‘access’ over holding power accountable. Beyond their cozy relations with politicians, the commentariat don’t support this type of social media activism because it subverts the establishment media’s power. Over one million viewed Antoine’s interaction with Joly on my X account and hundreds of thousands more on others’ social media platforms.
Alongside media commentators, Liberal ministers came to Joly’s defence. Heritage Minister Pascale St-Onge posted on X, “As MPs, we’re here to listen to the public. It’s part of our job. There are many ways to reach us, to express yourself. But no one deserves to be harassed, followed and filmed without their consent in their private life. My heart goes out to my colleague and friend, Melanie Joly.”
Leaving aside her “my heart goes out” hyperbole, St-Onge is a hypocrite. Three days later St-Onge and her staff cancelled a press conference, hid in a room for half an hour, called the police and ultimately fled out a backdoor to avoid a simple question about her government backing a holocaust in Gaza. When I arrived a few minutes late to a press conference with St-Onge a TVA cameraman was waiting in the room and the minister was touring a public housing project. The press people asked my name and then what I was planning to ask the minister about (which was the Heritage Minister’s silence on Israel destroying 40 UNESCO sites and killing 100 journalists in Gaza). Five minutes later they asked me to leave. I refused. Subsequently, they said the minister would not return to conclude the press conference so I found St-Onge. To avoid appearing on camera she hid inside an apartment for nearly half an hour while her attaché called the police and the manager of the facility to ask me to leave. As the police talked to me, the minister fled out a side door.
Hours after releasing a sanctimonious statement about the appropriate place to ask politicians questions, St-Onge went to embarrassing lengths to avoid taking my question at a press conference!
I already knew St-Onge’s ‘there’s a right time to communicate with politicians’ rhetoric was hogwash. A year ago I attended a press event with St-Onge and asked the then sports minister, who was pushing to bar Russian and Belarusian athletes from sports competitions, whether she felt the same way about US athletes after they invaded Iraq? She smirked and walked away.
As she left the room and waited for an elevator I asked the same question regarding Canadian athletes after the Canadian led bombing of Libya or Israeli athletes. Multiple millions viewed the clip on social media and the embarrassing encounter was picked up by a slew of major international media.
A bid to avoid a similar Media commentators and Liberal ministers are angry a father filmed himself challenging Canada’s foreign minister on the street for enabling genocide. The outrage exposes the media/political establishment’s anti-democratic ethos.
Ten days ago, a man biking with his two kids saw Melanie Joly on Laurier Avenue in Montreal and asked the foreign minister to “lift the cap on the number of Palestinian refugees”. In response, Joly hit his phone and grabbed his jacket. Antoine (sole identification of the man) then told the minister to calm down and after she mentions the children with him says he’s trying to instill “good values” in them by opposing Israel’s killing. After the minister says she’s trying to have a relaxing walk Antoine says she doesn’t have that right while enabling a genocide in Gaza. Antoine then says it’s his job to harass her for promoting genocide.
Two weeks before the incident Joly made what she called a “solidarity” trip to a state the International Court of Justice found to plausibly committing genocide. In response to its mass killings in Gaza, Joly’s Global Affairs sped up the approval of weapons permits to Israel, okaying $28.5 million in arms in the two months after its onslaught on Gaza began.
A slew of commentators condemned Antoine, not Joly who may have assaulted him. They seem to believe Canada’s foreign minister can enable mass slaughter and not expect to be challenged about it. A number of the commentators demanded greater police protection for the minister even though an RCMP agent was with Joly. Radio Canada’s flagship weekly program Tout Le Monde en Parle (everyone is talking about it) played the video and had the minister on to discuss how difficult it’s been for her during the past six months.
According to the commentariat, people filming themselves challenging politicians on the street is a threat to democracy. Of course, this is an inversion of reality. While sometimes messy and unpleasant, common people questioning politicians and sharing it on social media subverts our society’s political passivity and the dominant media’s power to ‘manufacture consent’ for imperialism. Journalists with regular access to politicians rarely ask tough questions on international affairs, prioritizing ‘access’ over holding power accountable. Beyond their cozy relations with politicians, the commentariat don’t support this type of social media activism because it subverts the establishment media’s power. Over one million viewed Antoine’s interaction with Joly on my X account and hundreds of thousands more on others’ social media platforms.
Alongside media commentators, Liberal ministers came to Joly’s defence. Heritage Minister Pascale St-Onge posted on X, “As MPs, we’re here to listen to the public. It’s part of our job. There are many ways to reach us, to express yourself. But no one deserves to be harassed, followed and filmed without their consent in their private life. My heart goes out to my colleague and friend, Melanie Joly.”
Leaving aside her “my heart goes out” hyperbole, St-Onge is a hypocrite. Three days later St-Onge and her staff cancelled a press conference, hid in a room for half an hour, called the police and ultimately fled out a backdoor to avoid a simple question about her government backing a holocaust in Gaza. When I arrived a few minutes late to a press conference with St-Onge a TVA cameraman was waiting in the room and the minister was touring a public housing project. The press people asked my name and then what I was planning to ask the minister about (which was the Heritage Minister’s silence on Israel destroying 40 UNESCO sites and killing 100 journalists in Gaza). Five minutes later they asked me to leave. I refused. Subsequently, they said the minister would not return to conclude the press conference so I found St-Onge. To avoid appearing on camera she hid inside an apartment for nearly half an hour while her attaché called the police and the manager of the facility to ask me to leave. As the police talked to me, the minister fled out a side door.
Hours after releasing a sanctimonious statement about the appropriate place to ask politicians questions, St-Onge went to embarrassing lengths to avoid taking my question at a press conference!
I already knew St-Onge’s ‘there’s a right time to communicate with politicians’ rhetoric was hogwash. A year ago I attended a press event with St-Onge and asked the then sports minister, who was pushing to bar Russian and Belarusian athletes from sports competitions, whether she felt the same way about US athletes after they invaded Iraq? She smirked and walked away.
As she left the room and waited for an elevator I asked the same question regarding Canadian athletes after the Canadian led bombing of Libya or Israeli athletes. Multiple millions viewed the clip on social media and the embarrassing encounter was picked up by a slew of major international media.
A bid to avoid a similar clip may explain why she went to such absurd lengths to elude my questioning her on camera (though after a run across a parking lot I opened the heritage minister’s door to question her before she drove off). Politicians controlling questions and scripting public events is a far bigger threat to democracy than common people rudely filming them on the street. So is a Montreal media sphere which devoted more attention to criticizing a father for challenging the foreign minister on the street then to 20 weeks in a row of mass marches in the city against Canada’s complicity in Israel’s genocide (from week 5 to 26 the media all but stopped covering the protests even though thousands came out each weekend).
Joly, St-Onge, Justin Trudeau and others should be questioned on video whenever possible. We need to give the decision-makers a bit of a headache and inspire like-minded individuals to act. With the dominant media largely refusing to cover critical perspectives on important international issues, we need to find other ways to put forward our message and push back against government policies.
Shame on all the commentators and politicians who denigrated a father for challenging Canada’s foreign affairs minister for promoting genocide. We need more people with Antoine’s convictions and a willingness to act.clip may explain why she went to such absurd lengths to elude my questioning her on camera (though after a run across a parking lot I opened the heritage minister’s door to question her before she drove off). Politicians controlling questions and scripting public events is a far bigger threat to democracy than common people rudely filming them on the street. So is a Montreal media sphere which devoted more attention to criticizing a father for challenging the foreign minister on the street then to 20 weeks in a row of mass marches in the city against Canada’s complicity in Israel’s genocide (from week 5 to 26 the media all but stopped covering the protests even though thousands came out each weekend).
Joly, St-Onge, Justin Trudeau and others should be questioned on video whenever possible. We need to give the decision-makers a bit of a headache and inspire like-minded individuals to act. With the dominant media largely refusing to cover critical perspectives on important international issues, we need to find other ways to put forward our message and push back against government policies.
Shame on all the commentators and politicians who denigrated a father for challenging Canada’s foreign affairs minister for promoting genocide. We need more people with Antoine’s convictions and a willingness to act.across a parking lot I opened the heritage minister’s door to question her before she drove off). Politicians controlling questions and scripting public events is a far bigger threat to democracy than common people rudely filming them on the street. So is a Montreal media sphere which devoted more attention to criticizing a father for challenging the foreign minister on the street then to 20 weeks in a row of mass marches in the city against Canada’s complicity in Israel’s genocide (from week 5 to 26 the media all but stopped covering the protests even though thousands came out each weekend).
Joly, St-Onge, Justin Trudeau and others should be questioned on video whenever possible. We need to give the decision-makers a bit of a headache and inspire like-minded individuals to act. With the dominant media largely refusing to cover critical perspectives on important international issues, we need to find other ways to put forward our message and push back against government policies.
Shame on all the commentators and politicians who denigrated a father for challenging Canada’s foreign affairs minister for promoting genocide. We need more people with Antoine’s convictions and a willingness to act.
Warner Bros Discovery has confirmed its plans to shut down Newshub in Aotearoa New Zealand, including its website and all TV news shows by July 5 — 294 staff will lose their jobs.
The company says no deal is in place yet with any third party to supply daily news.
Newshub staff learned of the company’s decision at a meeting fronted by Warner Bros Discovery’s Australia and New Zealand chief Glenn Kyne and its Asia-Pacific president James Gibbons today.
In a statement, Gibbons said there was “nothing anyone in our New Zealand networks business could have done better” to avoid the closure.
“It was a combination of very strong economic headwinds both in New Zealand and the global market,” he said.
“The downturn has been severe, and the bounce-back has not materialised as expected.”
Warner Bros Discovery first revealed its proposal to close Newshub on February 28. Newshub Michael Morrah told RNZ’s Midday Report many staff saw today’s decision as inevitable.
‘Many resigned themselves’
“The confirmation was still very upsetting and disappointing, but nothing like the shock of six weeks ago. Many had resigned themselves to the closure,” he said.
“I have worked here for 18 years. We believe in what we do. And know it is important to the people who watch — 900,000 every week. What happens to those people who relied on us to present key news and current affairs?
“And to the investigations that are being worked on?”
Gibbons said $74 million disappeared from broadcast TV advertising in New Zealand in 2023 alone. That was the single largest year-on-year drop over the last three decades outside of the Global Financial Crisis in 2007-8.
“Every business in its own market has to be financially sustainable, and we simply could not continue in our current form.”
Fresh annual figures released yesterday showed total TV advertising revenue in New Zealand TV fell from $517 million in 2022 to $443 million last year. Digital advertising revenue is increasing but the vast bulk of that goes to offshore tech companies Google and Facebook.
Kyne said free-to-air and news operations were too expensive to run as they were. He was concerned that the move would leave TVNZ as the only service running free-to-air broadcast news, but said there was no other choice.
TVNZ’s Sunday also for the chop . . . “We are deeply aware of the effect this is likely to have on the plurality of media voices in New Zealand. Having just one TV news operation in New Zealand — that is state-owned — will be an ongoing issue until it is solved,” says Warner Bros Discovery’s NZ chief Glenn Kyne. Image: TVNZ screenshot APR
Impact on plurality
“We are deeply aware of the effect this is likely to have on the plurality of media voices in New Zealand. Having just one TV news operation in New Zealand — that is state-owned — will be an ongoing issue until it is solved.
“But as we noted on the day, it is simply impossible to continue operating in our current form.”
The final day for staff who have been made redundant will be on July 5, and that will also be the final day for the Newshub bulletin, the statement said.
“Myself and six colleagues suggested a stripped back Newshub live at 6 and retention of the Newshub (website) to transition from linear TV to a fully-digital model. We thought we had a profitable way forward.
‘We were told the option would be problematic for WBD and produce a downward trajectory for the business,“ Newshub’s investigations editor Michael Morrah told RNZ’s Midday Report.
Other alternative proposals to replace or continue Newshub were also considered amid heavy secrecy, bolstered by the use of non-disclosure agreements.
Considering proposals
In recent days media reports have indicated WBD has been considering proposals from other media companies to create a news service for the company’s channels.
New Zealand Herald media commentator Shayne Currie yesterday reported that Stuff was a leading contender for taking on the organisation’s 6pm news. Some have speculated that NZME, which owns the Herald and Newstalk ZB, could also have an interest.
WBD said today no arrangement with any third party was in place but Mediawatch understands the company has already rebuffed several and is only pursuing projects with one or two players.
Stuff reported yesterday that Stuff was “understood to be a likely contender” but a spokesperson for Stuff declined to comment on whether it had been in talks with Warner Bros Discovery.
“The main thing is Newshub needs a lifeline. These people deserve a lifeline. Those people who are looking to do these deals, get on and get them done and save some of these people and save some news for Kiwis,” Newshub presenter Patrick Gower told reporters after today’s announcement.
Kyne said the company’s “door has been open to listening to all internal and external feedback and ideas, and we will continue to do so”.
“However, as of now, no deal regarding news output has been made.”
Warner Bros Discovery is also looking to work with Nga Taonga to preserve its 30-year news archives. Image: TVNZ screenshot APR
News archives
Kyne said the company was also looking to work with Nga Taonga to preserve its 30-year news archives.
Mediawatch understands that several staff made submissions calling on the company to preserve those archives, with fears that years of work — and New Zealand history — could be lost if they were deleted.
Newshub’s shutdown is the biggest and most far-reaching news closure in the post-covid era.
“Every time we think we’ve landed on stable footing, something comes along and makes it unstable again, forcing us to look at ways of further reducing costs,” Kyne said in a statement when the closure was first proposed.
“We’ve now reached a stage where any further reduction in costs means . . . proposing to shut down the newsroom and the Newshub website.”
“Everyone can see that the media sector, here in New Zealand, and around the world is facing some very tough circumstances. While Warner Bros Discovery is a large global media company, each business is managed on its ability to sustain itself within the market it operates in.
“Subsidising losses for ongoing years indefinitely is not sustainable,” said Gibbons.
At the time, Warner Bros Discovery said its proposal was is to make the ThreeNow online app “the core of the model, supported by free-to-air linear channels” such as Three, Bravo, Eden, Rush and HGTV.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
All of Newshub operations — part of New Zealand’s second largest television news network channel Three — are to be shut down and 250 people will lose their jobs. The shutdown includes the company’s website, Warner Bros Discovery announced today.
The last 6pm news bulletin will air on July 5.
Warner Bros Discovery said talks were ongoing with third parties to provide a pared-back news service — such as a 6pm bulletin for the Three channel. However, no deals have been reached yet.
Head of networks Glen Kyne said Warner Bros Discovery had been clear it would listen to all feedback both internal and external over the five-week consultation period.
“Our door has been open and some conversations have taken place. They’re continuing to take place in confidence but there is no deal,” he said.
He promised to let staff know immediately if any new deals could be finalised.
The shutdown news as reported on Newshub’s website today. Image” Newshub screenshot APR
He thanked staff for their feedback.
Definite shutdown
The announcement of the definite shutdown came at an all-staff meeting at a hall close to Newshub’s office in Auckland’s Eden Terrace this morning.
The newsroom was losing too much money, staff were told.
Here is all the full information – devastated for my pals, colleagues and everyone who gives 110% there, NZ is a worse off place today with this news. https://t.co/q8HurxwV5g
