Nobel Peace Prize laureate and press freedom champion Maria Ressa wasn’t intending to make breaking news when she planned her keynote address at the East-West Center’s 2022 International Media Conference in Honolulu this week.
But late the night before she got disturbing word from her lawyers that the Philippines government’s Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) had issued an order for her online news organisation Rappler to shut down.
“You are the first to hear this,” Ressa said, as she told the combined in-person and online audiences of around 450 international journalists and media professionals gathered for the conference about the commission’s order.
Under now-former President Rodrigo Duterte, Ressa and Rappler have faced multiple charges, widely believed to be retaliation for her critical reporting on Duterte’s deadly drug war and abuses of power.
Ressa vowed to continue fighting the commission’s order, even as new President Ferdinand Marcos Jr — son of the late Philippines dictator who was forced to flee the country in 1986 — prepared to be sworn into office yesterday.
In the meantime, she said, “It is business as usual for Rappler. We will adapt, adjust, survive, and thrive. As usual, we will hold power to account. We will tell the truth.”
Safeguarding freedom of expression
Ressa’s struggle to thwart the government’s efforts to shut down her groundbreaking news outlet and imprison her for cyber-libel led to Ressa becoming the first Filipino recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize for her “efforts to safeguard freedom of expression, which is a precondition for democracy and lasting peace,” as the Nobel Committee put it.
In her address to the media conference, Ressa bemoaned the fact that the global environment for quality journalism has deteriorated so quickly, in part because at least initially there was a reluctance to accept just how much damage the online world can do to the real one.
“Online violence is real-world violence,” she said. “They’re not separate. Digital impunity is real-world impunity.
“There is only one world that we live in, and for the platforms and legislators to think that these are two systems has weakened the rule of law in the real world.”
After being brutally attacked online by Duterte backers, Ressa has campaigned tirelessly against what she called a “tyranny of trends.” Through their algorithms, social media platforms have created a new information ecosystem that prioritises “lies laced with anger and hate” over “boring” facts, she said.
“These platforms are determining the future of news, and yet their driver is profit, right? The platform’s profit — not the public’s, not journalism’s.”
That system has made it more difficult for humans to listen to their better angels, Ressa said, because “social media gave the devil a megaphone. And this is why we are seeing the worst of human nature.”
The problem, she said, is that the forces of manipulation do not need to convince the public of anything. They only need to sow doubt and uncertainty in order to create distrust of the facts.
Maria Ressa talks to journalists … Rappler was built on a foundation of three pillars to rebuild trust in the news media: technology, journalism and community. Image: East-West Center
Pillars of trust
Ressa said Rappler was built on a foundation of three pillars to rebuild trust in the news media: technology, journalism and community.
“Tech has to be first because this was the spark that ignited the world, and not for good,” she explained.
“Journalism, because we must continue independent journalism despite what it costs us, and we must let our societies know that. And finally community, because journalists can’t do this alone.”
The importance of maintaining independent journalism outlets is intensified by the fact that this year there are more than 30 elections globally, according to Ressa: “I said this in the Nobel lecture: If you don’t have integrity of facts, how can you have integrity of elections? You can’t, and that’s the problem.”
The consequences can be catastrophic, she said. “When real people who are insidiously manipulated online then democratically elect an illiberal leader and the balance of power of the world shifts, how much more time do we have before we move into a fascist world?”
Banding together against disinformation
Ressa counsels independent journalists around the world to build their courage, commitment and, most importantly, community, saying the only way to stand up to the forces of disinformation is to join hands.
Before the recent elections in the Philippines, for example, 16 news organisations agreed to collaborate on fact-checking campaign statements.
“We shared each with other,” Ressa said. “We made the content agnostic. We’re not competing against each other; we’re competing against evil and lies.”
That experience helped inform Ressa’s vision of a world in which trust in facts and institutions can be rebuilt on four levels. The first and most basic is independent journalism as exemplified by news organisations like hers.
The second she calls “the mesh”, elements of civil society that can take the facts news outlets and share them with emotion and inspiration.
The third level is academic research designed to help better understand the societal challenges, which continue to evolve. The final level is a proactive legal approach in which lawyers engage in both tactical and strategic litigation, rather than simply waiting to defend against the latest attacks.
Still, Ressa admitted that she is extremely worried about the future of objective journalism and the societies that rely on it.
The world does have the resources to fight back, she but not as individuals: “We really must work together,” she concluded. “And a global coalition is the best way to do this.”
Journalist and editor-in-chief Raimundos Oki of Timor-Leste’s online media Oekusipost.com was today accused of “violating legal secrets” related to his reporting about the case of illegal detention and forced virginity testing of about 30 underage girls in Oe-Kusi Ambeno during 2020.
The Dili District Court sentenced a former American missionary to 12 years’ jail in a controversial paedophilia case.
At the same time the government mandated several local police to detain about 30 underage girls from the Topu-Honis shelter for two weeks and to perform forced virginity tests in June 2020 in Oe-Kusi Ambeno.
According to the World Health Organisation (WHO) and UN human rights agencies, the practice of virginity testing on girls is a violation. However, human rights activists in Timor-Leste are alleged to have kept silent about the case.
Daschbasch is already serving his sentence in Becora-Dili prison, but the victims of forced virginity tests are still awaiting justice.
According to their statement at the Oe-Kusi Ambeno District Court, they had never been sexually abused or raped by anyone but their genitals had been injured when forcibly tested.
Journalist Oki was charged with violating legal secrecy because of his coverage of the Topu-Honis shelter case, including the case of forced virginity testing.
He exercised his right of silence while appearing before the Criminal Investigation Scientific Police (Polícia Científica de Investigação Criminal) office.
We will continue bringing you the news, holding the powerful to account for their actions and decisions, calling attention to government lapses that further disempower the disadvantaged. We will hold the line.
Dear readers and viewers, We thought this day would never come, even as we were warned in the first of week of December last year that the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) would be handing down a ruling against us.
Because we have acted in good faith and adhered to the best standards in a fast-evolving business environment, we were confident that the country’s key business regulator would put public interest above other interests that were at play in this case.
We were, in fact, initially relieved that it was the SEC that initiated what appeared to us as a customary due diligence act, considering our prior information that it was the Office of the Solicitor-General that had formed, as early as November 2016, a special team to build a case against us.
We were wrong. The SEC’s kill order revoking Rappler’s licence to operate is the first of its kind in history — both for the Commission and for Philippine media. What this means for you, and for us, is that the Commission is ordering us to close shop, to cease telling you stories, to stop speaking truth to power, and to let go of everything that we have built — and created — with you since 2012.
All because they focused on one clause in one of our contracts which we submitted to — and was accepted by — the SEC in 2015.
Now the Commission is accusing us of violating the Constitution, a serious charge considering how, as a company imbued with public interest, we have consistently been transparent and above-board in our practices.
Transparency best proof Every year since we incorporated in 2012, we have dutifully complied with all SEC regulations and submitted all requirements even at the risk of exposing our corporate data to irresponsible hands with an agenda.
Transparency, we believe, is the best proof of good faith and good conduct. All these seem not to matter as far as the SEC is concerned.
In a record investigation time of 5 months and after President Rodrigo Duterte himself blasted Rappler in his second SONA in July 2017, the SEC released this ruling against us.
This is pure and simple harassment, the seeming coup de grace to the relentless and malicious attacks against us since 2016:
We intend to not only contest this through all legal processes available to us, but also to fight for our freedom to do journalism and for your right to be heard through an independent platform like Rappler.
We’ve been through a lot together, through good and bad — sharing stories, building communities, inspiring hope, uncovering wrongdoing, battling trolls, exposing the fake. We will continue bringing you the news, holding the powerful to account for their actions and decisions, calling attention to government lapses that further disempower the disadvantaged.
We will hold the line. The support you’ve shown us all this time, and our commitment to tell you stories without fear, give us hope.
You inspire courage. You have taught us that when you stand and fight for what is right, there is no dead-end, only obstacles that can only make us stronger. We ask you to stand with us again at this difficult time.
Nobel Peace Prize laureate and journalist Maria Ressa says that the Philippine government has ordered her news organisation Rappler to shut down, reports Axios.
The online news website Rappler has exposed Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte’s “bloody war on drugs”, documented the government’s propagation of disinformation and been critical of President-elect “Bongbong” Marcos Jr, son of the late dictator.
Ressa, a Filipino-American, said in a keynote address at the East-West Center’s International Media Conference in Honolulu, Hawai’i, that the Philippine Securities and Exchange Commission had issued the decree on Tuesday, reports Nathan Bomey.
She said Rappler would fight the order, which “affirmed” an earlier decision to revoke the organisation’s certificates of incorporation.
“We’re not shutting down. Well, I’m not supposed to say that,” Ressa said.
“We are entitled to appeal this decision and will do so, especially since the proceedings were highly irregular.”
Axios reported that the Philippine embassy in the US did not immediately respond to a request seeking comment.
Shared Nobel Peace Prize Ressa shared the 2021 Nobel Peace Prize with Russian journalist Dmitry Muratov after using her platform to raise awareness of Duterte’s alleged abuses.
She had previously been convicted in the Philippines of “cyber libel” and could serve prison time in a case widely seen as politically motivated.
Ressa has also been a vocal critic of social media platforms for failing to prevent the flow of falsehoods.
“You don’t get facts. It’s toxic sludge. Social media encourages anger, hate, conspiracy theories. There’s violence,” and it’s getting worse, she added.
Pacific Journalism Review is publishing several articles about Rappler and media freedom in next month’s edition.
OBITUARY:A personal reflection by Scott Waide in Lae
Australian-born former PNG cabinet minister and Madang businessman Sir Sir Peter Leslie Charles Barter, 82 — 1940-2022
Papua New Guinean political giant Sir Peter Barter, who died in Cairns on Wednesday, was a strong supporter of the free press and media development. He personally supported generations of students from Divine Word University.
Watson Gabana and I and many others who came later were beneficiaries of that support.
On one occasion, we travelled with Sir Peter to Long Island and Karkar to visit health centres and aid posts. He gave me his camcorder to use.
At the time, MiniDVs were the latest on the market and rare. No TV station was using them yet.
As a 19-year-old, I was over the moon! I didn’t shoot enough footage.
Or at least Sir Peter didn’t think I did. He scolded me in the chopper then gave me advice. It stuck. Don’t waste time. Don’t waste money. Don’t waste opportunities.
Sure enough, I never got a chance to go back to Long Island. But the experience made an indelible mark.
My first insights
It gave me my first insights into the workings of PNG politics, its flaws and the failures of service delivery mechanism.
On Long Island, Sir Peter was furious. He, as Madang Governor, was angered by the fact that the people were neglected and the health system just didn’t work.
“It’s out of sight, out of mind,” he fumed. “As long as nobody complains, none of this will be resolved.”
He stormed off towards the beach with the village councillor led in tow.
It was a statement that has remained true for service delivery in PNG — “Out of sight, out of mind.”
As much as it seems improper and out of line, the politician gives much needed visibility to issues of importance.
Sir Peter was an avid photographer. He used his photography to document the Bougainville peace process and the collection and destruction of small arms in Tambul-Nebiliyer and the Southern Highlands.
Plight of the Manam people
He filmed the Manam volcano eruptions and gave unique insights into the plight of the Manam people while at the same time conducting rescue operations for men, women and children.
His sometimes dry sarcastic sense of humour was legendary.
Two decades later, I found myself at the Madang Resort restaraunt, arguing with the chef about the pizza that didn’t have the ingredients that were promised on the brochure.
Sir Peter walked up behind me and asked what the problem was. I promptly directed my complaint to him (the owner of the pizza joint). He quickly responded: “Please give the whinging journalist what he paid for.”
We went away happy and began another discussion with him about the drop in tourism numbers in Madang and PNG.
Long live the Knight!
Scott Waide is an independent Papua New Guinean journalist who contributes to Asia Pacific Report.
Following the United Kingdom’s decision to extradite Julian Assange to face trial in the United States, the International Federation of Journalists’ (IFJ) Australian affiliate, the Media, Entertainment and Arts Alliance (MEAA) has called on the Australian government to take swift steps to lobby for the dismissal of all charges against Assange.
The IFJ stands with the MEAA in condemning the extradition order and calls for Assange to be pardoned and allowed to be with his family.
On June 17, UK Home Secretary Priti Patel approved Assange’s extradition to the US to face charges, primarily under the nation’s Espionage Act, for releasing US government records that revealed the US military committed war crimes against civilians in Afghanistan and Iraq, including the killing of two Reuters journalists.
Assange, a member of the MEAA since 2007, may now only have a slim chance of challenging the extradition.
If found guilty, Assange faces up to 175 years in prison.
The WikiLeaks founder is highly likely to be detained in the US under conditions of isolation or solitary confinement, despite the US government’s assurances, which would severely exacerbate his risk of suicide.
WikiLeaks was awarded the Walkley Award for Most Outstanding Contribution to Journalism in 2011, an annual prize to reward excellence in Australian journalism, in recognition of the impact of WikiLeaks’ actions on public interest journalism by assisting whistleblowers to tell their stories.
According to the MEAA, Walkley judges said WikiLeaks applied new technology to”‘penetrate the inner workings of government to reveal an avalanche of inconvenient truths in a global publishing coup”.
Whistleblowers have since been used by other media outlets to expose global tax avoidance schemes, among other stories.
In the case of WikiLeaks, only Julian Assange faces charges, with no other WikiLeaks media partners cited in any US government legal actions.
In 2017, Chelsea Manning, a US Army intelligence analyst who released classified information to WikiLeaks, was pardoned by former US President Barack Obama.
MEAA media section federal president Karen Percy said: “We urge the new Australian government to act on Julian Assange’s behalf and lobby for his release. The actions of the US are a warning sign to journalists and whistleblowers everywhere and undermine the importance of uncovering wrongdoing.
“Our thoughts are with Julian and his family at this difficult time.”
The IFJ said: “The United Kingdom Home Secretary’s decision to allow the extradition of Julian Assange is a significant blow to media freedom and a dire threat to journalists, whistleblowers, and media workers worldwide.
“The IFJ urges the government of Australia to act swiftly to intervene and lobby the United States and United Kingdom governments to dismiss all charges against Assange. Journalism is not a crime.”
Last week on June 17 2022, UK Home Secretary Priti Patel issued a statement confirming she had approved the US government’s request to extradite Julian Assange.
The Australian founder of WikiLeaks faces 18 criminal charges of computer misuse and espionage.
This decision means Assange is one step closer to extradition, but has not yet reached the final stage in what has been a years-long process. Patel’s decision follows a March decision to deny leave to appeal by the UK Supreme Court, affirming the High Court decision that accepted assurances provided by the US government and concluded there were no remaining legal bars to Assange’s extradition.
The High Court decision overruled an earlier decision by a District Court that extraditing Assange to the US would be “unjust and oppressive” because the prison conditions he was likely to experience would make him a high risk for suicide.
In the High Court’s view, the American government’s assurances sufficiently reduced the risk.
Another appeal ahead WikiLeaks has already announced Assange will appeal the home secretary’s decision in the UK courts. He can appeal on an issue of law or fact, but must obtain leave of the High Court to launch an appeal.
This is a fresh legal process rather than a continuation of the judicial stage of extradition that followed his arrest in 2019.
Assange’s brother has stated the appeal will include new information, including reports of plots to assassinate Assange.
Several legal issues argued before the District Court in 2020 are also likely to be raised in the next appeal. In particular, the District Court decided the question of whether the charges were political offences, and therefore not extraditable crimes, could only be considered by the home secretary.
BREAKING: UK Home Secretary approves extradition of WikiLeaks publisher Julian Assange to the US where he would face a 175 year sentence – A dark day for Press freedom and for British democracy
The decision will be appealedhttps://t.co/m1bX8STSr8pic.twitter.com/5nWlxnWqO7
The question of whether and how the home secretary decided on this issue could now be ripe for argument.
Assange’s next appeal will also seek to re-litigate whether US government assurances regarding the prison conditions Assange will face are adequate or reliable. His lawyers will also again demand the UK courts consider the role of role of freedom of expression in determining whether to extradite Assange.
Assange will remain detained in Belmarsh prison while his appeal is underway. The decision of the High Court on his appeal against the home secretary’s decision may potentially be appealed to the Supreme Court.
If, after all legal avenues are exhausted in the UK, the order to extradite stands, Assange could take a human rights action to the European Court of Human Rights.
However, the European Court has rarely declared extradition to be contrary to the European Convention on Human Rights, except in cases involving the death penalty or whole-life sentences.
It has not yet considered freedom of expression in an extradition case.
Further appeals could add years more to the saga of Assange’s detention.
Responses from the Assange family and human rights advocates Assange’s wife, Stella Moris, called Patel’s decision a ‘“travesty”. His brother Gabriel Shipton called it “shameful”. They have vowed to fight his extradition through every legal means available.
Julian Assange’s family respond to decision. Video: Reuters
According to the secretary-general of Amnesty International Agnes Callamard:
Assange faces a high risk of prolonged solitary confinement, which would violate the prohibition on torture or other ill treatment. Diplomatic assurances provided by the US that Assange will not be kept in solitary confinement cannot be taken on face value given previous history.
What role for the Australian government?
Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong and Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus responded to the latest development last night. They confirmed Australia would continue to provide consular assistance to Assange:
The Australian government has been clear in our view that Mr Assange’s case has dragged on for too long and that it should be brought to a close. We will continue to express this view to the governments of the United Kingdom and United States.
However, it remains unclear exactly what form Australia’s diplomatic or political advocacy is taking.
In December 2021, Anthony Albanese said he could not see what purpose was served by the ongoing pursuit of Assange. He is a signatory to a petition to free Assange. Since he was sworn in as prime minister, though, Albanese has resisted calls to demand publicly that the US drop its criminal charges against Assange.
In contrast, Albanese recently made a public call for the release of Sean Turnell from prison in Myanmar.
In a way, Patel’s decision last week closes a window for stronger advocacy between Australia and the UK. While the matter sat with the UK Home Secretary, the Australian government might have sought to intervene with it as a political issue.
Now it seems possible Australia may revert to its long established position of non-interference in an ongoing court process.
Some commentators argue this is insufficient and that Australia must, finally, do more for Assange. Tasmanian MP Andrew Wilkie said it was high time Australia treated this as the political matter it is, and demand from its allies in London and Washington that the matter be brought to an end.
Barrister Greg Barns likened Assange’s situation to that of David Hicks, who was imprisoned at Guantanamo Bay:
The Howard government at the time brought him back to Australia. This is not unprecedented. It is important that Australia is able to use the great relationship it has with Washington to ensure the safety of Australians.
These comments suggest that Australia ought to focus any advocacy towards the US government, making a case for the criminal charges and extradition request to be abandoned.
At this stage it is impossible to say if the Albanese government has the will to take a stronger stand on Assange’s liberty. The prime minister and foreign minister have certainly invested heavily in foreign relations in the early weeks of their government, with emphasis on the significance of the US alliance.
Perhaps strong advocacy on Assange’s behalf at this time might be regarded as unsettling and risky. The US has had plenty of opportunity, and its own change of government, and yet it has not changed its determination to prosecute Assange.
This is despite former President Barack Obama’s decision to commute the sentence of Chelsea Manning, the whistleblower who provided classified material to Assange for publication through Wikileaks.
Stronger Australian advocacy may well be negatively received. Assange’s supporters will continue to demand that Albanese act regardless, banking on the strength of the Australia-US alliance as capable of tolerating a point of disagreement.
As supporters of JulianAssange held a news conference Friday at the United Kingdom’s consulate in New York to demand freedom for the jailed WikiLeaks founder, a trio of leading leftist figures decried the British government’s approval of the ailing Australian’s extradition to the United States.
In a statement published ahead of Friday’s press conference, the three chairs of the Assange Defense Committee — linguist and political dissident Noam Chomsky, Pentagon Papers whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg, and Pulitzer Prize-winning author Alice Walker — blasted U.K. Home Secretary Priti Patel’sgreenlightingof Assange’s transfer to the U.S. earlier in the day. Assange plans to appeal the decision.
“It’s a sad day for Western democracy. The U.K.’s decision to extradite Julian Assange to the nation that plotted to assassinate him — the nation that wants to imprison him for 175 years for publishing truthful information in the public interest — is an abomination,” the trio said, referring to analleged 2017 CIA schemeto kidnap or kill the WikiLeaks founder.
“We expect the world’s most despised autocrats to persecute journalists, publishers, and whistleblowers. We expect totalitarian regimes to gaslight their people and crack down on those who challenge the government,” they continued. “Shouldn’t we expect Western democracies to behave better?”
BREAKING Noam Chomsky, Daniel Ellsberg, and Alice Walker React to the Assange Extradition Sign Off:
The U.S. government argues that its venerated Constitution does not protect journalism the government dislikes, and that publishing truthful information in the public interest is a subversive, criminal act.
This argument is a threat not only to journalism, but to democracy itself. The U.K. has shown its complicity in this farce, by agreeing to extradite a foreigner based on politically motivated charges that collapse under the slightest scrutiny.
Speakers at Friday’s event in New York included Assange’s father and progressive German parliamentarian Sevim Dağdelen, who said that “today is a dark day for press freedom, a dark day for human rights.”
LIVE NOW: The family of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange holds a press conference after Assange’s extradition to the U.S. was approved Friday by UK Home Secretary Priti Patel https://t.co/DIMfb7dxk9
The Media, Entertainment and Arts Alliance calls on the Australian government to take urgent steps to lobby the US and UK governments to drop all charges against Assange and to allow him to be with his wife and children.
Assange, a MEAA member since 2007, may only have a slim chance of challenging extradition to face espionage charges for releasing US government records that revealed the US military committed war crimes against civilians in Afghanistan and Iraq, including the killing of two Reuters journalists.
If found guilty, Assange faces a jail term of up to 175 years.
MEAA media section federal president Karen Percy said it was a dangerous assault on international journalism.
“We urge the new Australian government to act on Julian Assange’s behalf and lobby for his release,” she said.
“The actions of the US are a warning sign to journalists and whistleblowers everywhere and undermine the importance of uncovering wrongdoing.
“Our thoughts are with Julian and his family at this difficult time.”
In 2011, WikiLeaks was awarded the Walkley Award for Most Outstanding Contribution to Journalism in recognition of the impact WikiLeaks’ actions had on public interest journalism by assisting whistleblowers to tell their stories.
At the time the Walkley judges said WikiLeaks applied new technology to “penetrate the inner workings of government to reveal an avalanche of inconvenient truths in a global publishing coup”.
BREAKING: UK Home Secretary approves extradition of WikiLeaks publisher Julian Assange to the US where he would face a 175 year sentence – A dark day for Press freedom and for British democracy
The decision will be appealedhttps://t.co/m1bX8STSr8pic.twitter.com/5nWlxnWqO7
This type of publishing partnership has been repeated by other media outlets since, using whistleblowers’ leaks to expose global tax avoidance schemes, among other stories.
In the WikiLeaks example, only Assange has been charged.
None of WikiLeaks media partners have been cited in any US government legal actions because of their collaboration with Assange.
#FreeJulianAssange
Background on the Julian Assange case. Video: Al Jazeera
An investigation by Al Jazeera has obtained an image of the bullet used to kill the network’s journalist Shireen Abu Akleh, reports Al Jazeera staff.
The photograph for the first time shows the type of ammunition used to kill the veteran Al Jazeera correspondent in the occupied West Bank last month.
According to ballistic and forensic experts, the green-tipped bullet was designed to pierce armour and is used in an M4 rifle. The round was extracted from her head.
The bullet was analysed using 3D models and, according to experts, it was 5.56mm calibre – the same as used by Israeli forces. The round was designed and manufactured in the United States, experts said.
In this undated photo, Shireen Abu Akleh stands next to a TV camera above the Old City of Jerusalem [Al Jazeera Media Network]
Fayez al-Dwairi, a former Jordanian major-general, told Al Jazeera the weapon and round used to kill Abu Akleh are regularly carried by Israeli forces.
“This M4 and this munition is used by the Israeli army. It is available and used by the units. I cannot say the whole unit, or most of the soldiers, but they use it,” al-Dwairi told Al Jazeera.
“When any soldier uses it, he uses it for a definite target — he wants to hunt, he wants to kill … There is no way to use it for another thing.”
Palestinian assistant Multilateral Affairs Minister Ammar Hijazi told Al Jazeera the bullet will remain with the Palestinian government for further investigation.
Abu Akleh, a longtime TV correspondent for Al Jazeera Arabic, was killed last month while covering Israeli army raids in the city of Jenin.
Abu Akleh’s case was sent to the International Criminal Court (ICC) and the investigation was recently handed over to the ICC prosecutor. The status of the case, however, remains unclear.
The 5.56mm bullet that killed Al Jazeera journalist Shireen Abu Akleh last month – designed to pierce armour and the same as used by Israeli forces. Image: Al Jazeera
“We think there is enough evidence with the prosecutor … that proves without reasonable doubt that the crime committed against Shireen Abu Akleh was done by the Israeli occupation and they are the perpetrators of this awful crime and they should be held responsible for it,” said Hijazi.
‘Trigger-happy policies’ Abu Akleh was wearing a press vest and standing with other journalists when she was killed.
Israeli authorities initially said Palestinian fighters were responsible for her death, circulating video of Palestinian men shooting down an alleyway. However, researchers from the Israeli human rights group B’Tselem found the spot where the clip was filmed and proved it was impossible to shoot Abu Akleh from there.
In an interview, Omar Shakir — Israel and Palestine director at Human Rights Watch — said all evidence indicates the kill shot came from an Israeli soldier.
Sherif Mansour, MENA programme coordinator of the Committee to Protect Journalists, told Al Jazeera from Washington, DC, that “the pattern” of killing Palestinian media workers “is well known”.
“We have documented at least 19 journalists who were killed by Israeli fire, some of them in the Gaza wars in vehicles marked as press in 2012 and 2014,” Mansour said.
“Some of them were also killed by Israeli snipers while wearing vests with press signs, away from any threatening situation, two of them in 2018. Clearly, we have a problem here of trigger-happy policies that allows this to continue.”
‘Justice and accountability’ In what appeared to be an unprovoked assault at the Al Jazeera correspondent’s funeral days after she was killed, Israeli officers attacked pallbearers, which almost caused them to drop Abu Akleh’s coffin — an incident broadcast live that caused international outrage.
An Israeli police investigation into the attack concluded no one should be punished, despite finding there had been police misconduct, the Israeli newspaper Haaretz reported.
Al Jazeera’s Nida Ibrahim, reporting from Ramallah in the occupied West Bank, said for Palestinians their version of events is being “confirmed by so many investigations”, including the latest one by Al Jazeera.
“Palestinians have been saying from day one that they know that the bullet that hit Shireen came from Israeli soldiers. The witnesses, the videos that we’ve seen from Palestinians who were there, show there were no Palestinian fighters around the area where Shireen was in,” Ibrahim said.
“Palestinians are seeking now is justice and accountability.”
‘The root cause’ A dual Palestinian-US national, Abu Akleh was one of Al Jazeera’s first field correspondents, joining the network in 1997.
Ori Givati, a former Israeli soldier now with the advocacy group Breaking the Silence, said the round that was analysed was a “very common bullet”.
“It is the bullet that most [Israeli] soldiers use during their service,” he told Al Jazeera.
“This investigation into Shireen’s killing is extremely important, but we also have to remember these incidents happen on a weekly basis.
“Our country understands that if you really look into these cases it all goes back to the root cause. It is why the system is terrified from actually conducting investigations. I haven’t seen Israel really investigate any incident.”
Al Jazeera emailed Israel’s Foreign Press Department for comment early Friday but did not immediately receive a response.
Pacific Media Watch collaborates with Reporters Without Borders.
Assassinated journalist Shireen Abu Akleh … for Palestinians their version of events is being “confirmed by so many investigations”, including the latest one by Al Jazeera. Image: Al Jazeera
UPDATE: On the afternoon of 16 June, we received news that 16 of the jailed journalists had been remanded in prison. The remaining six people have been released, but may still face charges
On 8 June the Turkish state arrested 22 people – 20 of them journalists – in the city of Diyarbakır. They also confiscated hard drives, cameras and other equipment. Those arrested have been detained for almost a week in solitary confinement.
The Turkish state has declared the case confidential, so no information is currently available about the charges against the imprisoned journalists. In 2016, Turkey was listed as the world’s biggest jailer of journalists, and the country is still locking them up in huge numbers.
Many of the arrested journalists are from Jin News, a radical volunteer-run women’s media organisation.
Diyarbakır – known as Amed in Kurdish – is in Bakur, the part of Kurdistan within Turkey’s borders
Political genocide
The arrests form part of a campaign of state repression that has been dubbed a political genocide. It’s aimed at destroying the radically democratic movements and institutions which have grown both in Bakur and Turkey, which take their inspiration from the Kurdish Freedom Movement.
10,000 people are currently in prison in Turkey for charges relating to the Kurdish Freedom Movement.
This attack is doubly strong against the Kurdish women’s movement, which is at the forefront of the revolutionary struggle. The three pillars of that struggle are radical democracy, women’s freedom, and building an ecological society.
The women of the Kurdish Freedom Movement have paid a high price. For example, Ayşe Gökkan, spokeswoman of the Free Women’s Association (TJA), was sentenced to 30 years in prison in 2021. And Leyla Güven, the co-chair of the Democratic Society Congress (DTK), was sentenced to 22 years in 2020. The state has opened a new case against Leyla in an attempt to extend this sentence even further.
Last week, I was part of a grassroots political delegation that travelled to Amed in solidarity with the movements there. We aimed to learn and take inspiration from our Kurdish comrades’ resilience and ingenuity in the face of state fascism. The delegation included people from UK anti-repression organisations, Kurdistan solidarity groups and a radical trade union.
We will carry on
Medya Üren
Our delegation spoke to Jin News reporter Medya Üren about the recent arrests of journalists. Medya remains defiant and committed to carrying on her work. We met her in the Jin News office that police had raided the week before, amongst computers that the cops had stripped of their hard drives.
Medya told us that, because of the seizure of her equipment, she had had to report the news with only her mobile phone. She said:
People think that because you face repression, you lose your motivation – but actually, the more we face this repression, the more our motivation increases. For example, even though we don’t have anything to write our news on because they took our equipment, I’m even more motivated to write about it.
Medya said that since the raid there had been an outpouring of support for Jin News. And many young people had contacted them asking to volunteer. She told us that as the organisation grew stronger, the state’s attacks against it grew stronger too.
Becomine a journalist
We asked Medya how she had become involved in Jin News. She told us that she had decided to become a journalist because of her life experiences and what she “had been through”. Medya’s family were forced to leave their home in the 1990s because of Turkish state operations against Kurdish people. She said:
My village was in Şirnak [in the east of Bakur]. In 1993 we had to leave due to the state operations. My family left to Başur [Iraqi Kurdistan], they went to nine different places, and then ended up in Maxmour refugee camp.
During the 1990s, Turkish state forces murdered and disappeared Kurdish people with impunity. Over 3,000 Kurdish villages were burnt. Medya’s family was among thousands of refugees who fled to Maxmour camp, where Medya was born. The camp population swelled to over 12,000 people. Medya told us about her time in Maxmour:
I grew up there [in Maxmour], and I started to study healthcare and medicine in university there [in Başur] . Then the government kicked me out of the university. this is a sign of how federal Kurdistan [The Kurdistan Regional Government in Iraqi Kurdistan] is run by imperialist and fascist structures, and linked to the Turkish state.
Many other refugees from Maxmour were also kicked out of university. Medya said that this was an attempt by the authorities to force the refugees to go back to Bakur. Her family eventually decided to leave.
According to Medya, when they returned to Bakur many of her peers were drawn towards studying law, as a way to resist the Turkish state’s repression and imprisonment of the Kurdish people. But she wanted to become a journalist because of what she experienced when she was growing up. According to Medya:
I had witnessed a lot of things that I wanted the world to know about
She continued:
the things that are hidden, or maybe not heard – i wanted to make these things heard. you could say it’s like a childhood dream
Medya joined Jin News when she was just 17.
Women face the worst oppression
We asked Medya why she was passionate about women’s autonomous media. She told us:
everyone faces oppression here in Kurdistan. But women face the worst in all fields. whether in journalism or politics.
For example, a report states, that in the last months 16 female journalists were threatened or faced violence while working. and as a woman you face more violence, more harassment. so that’s why I wanted to work both as a Kurd, and as a woman journalist.
Medya spoke about the sexual violence against Kurdish women by Turkish forces. She gave the example of 18 year old Ipek Er. In 2020, Ipek Er committed suicide after she was abducted and raped by a Turkish sergeant – Musa Orhan. Orhan was initially arrested by the Turkish authorities, but was promptly released.
What happened to Ipek Er is, tragically, not uncommon. A Turkish non-commissioned officer attempted to rape a 13-year-old girl in Şırnak the same year. At least 3,000 women have been murdered since the conservative AKP government came to power, in what has been dubbed as femicide by the Kurdish movement.
Medya told us about how the mainstream media in Turkey treats women’s journalism:
in the mainstream media, the patriarchal view is felt heavily in the organisations. For example the news about women would be on the third page, and this news builds a ground for more crimes against women.
A media organisation which stays close to the people
Our delegation told Medya how UK journalism is dominated by privileged white men. We asked her how Jin News was different. She told us that Jin News operated in a radically different way to the mainstream media:
in the news agencies that are supporting the state, all the journalists and employees are of one mentality, there is no diversity, no opposing views. it’s the same patriarchal organisational structure. But here, we try to improve and diversify our structure.
Jin News is volunteer run and non-hierarchical. The organisation works to create opportunities to share knowledge about journalism. According to Medya:
we do workshops about women’s struggle, about journalism, to let people know what we are doing and to discuss what we can do among ourselves, how we can change and improve.
She continued:
we also visit families and we talk to people. When we go to another city, we would stay with families, they’d host us. The families support their children to join us and work with us.
‘You can be anything… except a Kurd’
We asked Medya what she thought the state’s strategy was in arresting journalists. She said:
The attitude towards our agency cannot be separated from the general attitude. The pro-state media is already saying that we are supporting terrorist organisations and making terrorist propaganda. These arrests and the media coverage show their true intentions. Here in Kurdistan you can be anything – a lawyer, or a journalist for example – except a Kurd. when you show your Kurdish identity you’ll be attacked.
The conversations my delegation had with other people on our trip to Amed highlight the grim truth in this statement. Lawyers, journalists, refugee rights organisations, ecological movements, trade unionists and politicians close to the Kurdish Freedom Movement are all facing terrorist charges.
Turkey is in the midst of a deep economic crisis – one that threatens the popularity of Recep Tayyip Erdoğan‘s dictatorial regime. In Medya’s opinion, the state wants to restrict media freedom in order to silence criticism of their handling of the economy. She told us:
Another level of this [media repression] policy is about hiding the economic crisis – these [arrest] campaigns are part of this policy of distraction. The government and state are forcing all media outlets, mainstream media, to make news in the way they want it.
Medya says that Jin News’ oppositional stance is at odds with the state’s attempts to create a compliant media, which simply repeats the state’s own rhetoric. According to Medya:
we try to cover all of these aspects in an oppositional way. that’s what disturbs them. that’s why we are targeted. because the state tries to build a single mentality in every field.
The arrests are part of Turkey’s dirty war
In Medya’s opinion, the Turkish state’s arrests and harassment of Kurdish media and other institutions can’t be separated from the war it’s waging against the Kurdish Freedom Movement. This war is taking place in all four parts of Kurdistan, which lies within the state borders of Turkey, Iran, Iraq and Syria.
The Turkish military launched invasions of Rojava (Northeast Syria) in 2018 and 2019 in an attempt to destroy the revolutionary society that is being built there. Turkish troops are currently occupying territory in Rojava amounting to thousands of kilometres. This includes the Northern cities of Afrin, Tel Abyad and Serekaniye. In Başur (Iraqi Kurdistan) the military is attacking Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) guerillas in the mountains with fighter jets, helicopters, drones and chemical weapons. Medya said:
Whether Başur, Rojhilat [the part of Kurdistan within Iran’s borders], Rojava or here. they’re running a dirty war campaign in all fields, not just from the military perspective. They’re using chemical weapons everywhere, committing war crimes. but also these [arrest] operations are part of this dirty campaign. it’s to intimidate people in every field. in media, politics, ecology…
Medya added that Abdullah Öcalan –the PKK’s co-founder – has been imprisoned in isolation in Turkey for 23 years. His imprisonment and isolation are emblematic of the attack on the whole movement. Medya said that the isolation policy against Öcalan was reflected in the attacks on Kurdish media organisations too.
In Medya’s opinion, the state wants to “cut off the head” of Kurdish organisations before they have a chance to grow. She said that Jin News was being targeted for being the people’s voice.
Medya told us that she would welcome collaborations between Jin News and radical media organisations in the UK. She said:
Even if we report with facts and proof, the government and mainstream media won’t recognise this. it’s difficult for us to be heard. For example the opposition CHP party was reacting greatly to some of the arrests of the Turkish journalists who were part of their media. But when its our journalists that are arrested here [in Bakur], there’s no coverage, no reaction. So we want everyone to be a voice for this. To share it.
Over 800 journalists called for the release of their colleagues
On Tuesday 14 June, 837 journalists and 62 institutions signed a statement in support of the detained journalists. It called on the international media and human rights organisations to take up the journalists’ case:
we expect international press organizations, journalists, rights organizations and defenders to show solidarity with us for the development of press freedom in Turkey and to take action against the oppression of journalists.
The statement called for the immediate release of the detained journalists:
Although these policies of oppression and intimidation are known very well by the free press tradition, which works devotedly for the right of people to receive information, we will not get used to these operations and policies of intimidation. The detained Kurdish journalists should be released immediately!
Turkey is trying to silence the voice of radical Kurdish women through its repression of Jin News. One way to break the wall of silence is by reading and sharingJin News’ work. You can also help keep the website going by becoming a subscriber.
Featured image by Medya Üren (with permission). This interview was carried out collaboratively with other members of my delegation.
This is part one of a series of interviews The Canary has carried out with Jin News journalists about Turkish state repression.
US media firm says it has not made contact with Fan who was detained in Beijing in 2020 on suspicion of national security crimes
Haze Fan, a Bloomberg News staff member in China who was detained in late 2020, was released on bail early this year, according to a statement by the Chinese embassy in Washington that was dated May and reported by the news organisation on Tuesday.
New York-based Bloomberg said in a news report that it was made aware of the embassy statement over the weekend, and that it had not been able to contact Fan.
The ninth Summit of the America’s opened in Los Angeles on Monday, June 6. This is the second time that the summit has been hosted in the United States. The Biden administration chose to exclude the elected governments of Cuba, Nicaragua and Venezuela, inviting members of the US-backed far right ‘opposition’ instead. That decision caused the presidents of other American countries to boycott the summit, notably Mexico, Bolivia, Honduras and Guatemala.
In protest, social movements from the United States and Latin America organized a counter summit, The People’s Summit, which begins on June 8. Journalists involved in the People’s Summit disrupted Biden’s sham Summit, confronting US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and the head of the US-controlled Organization of American States, Luis Amalgro.
Timor-Leste, the youngest independent nation and the most fledgling press in the Asia-Pacific, has finally shown how it’s done — with a big lesson for Pacific island neighbours.
Tackle the Chinese media gatekeepers and creeping authoritarianism threatening journalism in the region at the top.
In Dili on the final day of Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi’s grand Pacific tour to score more than 50 agreements and deals — although falling short of winning its Pacific region-wide security pact for the moment — newly elected (for the second time) President José Ramos-Horta won a major concession.
Under pressure from the democrat Ramos-Horta, a longstanding friend of a free media, Wang’s entourage caved in and allowed more questions like a real media conference.
Lusa newsagency correspondent in Dili Antonió Sampaio summed up the achievement in the face of the Pacific-wide secrecy alarm in a Facebook post: “After the controversy, the Chinese minister gave in and agreed to speak with journalists. A small victory for the media in Timor-Leste!”
Small victory, big tick
A small victory maybe. But it got a big tick from Timor-Leste Journalists Association president Zevonia Vieira and her colleagues. He thanked President Ramos-Horta for his role in ending the ban on local media and protecting the country’s freedom of information.
Media consultant Bob Howarth, a former PNG Post-Courier publisher and longtime adviser to the Timorese media, hailed the pushback against Chinese secrecy, saying the Chinese minister answering three questions — elsewhere in the region only one was allowed and that had to be by an approved Chinese journalist — as a “press freedom breakthrough”.
On the eve of Wang’s visit, Timor-Leste’s Press Council had denounced the restrictions being imposed on journalists before Horta’s intervention.
“In a democratic state like East Timor not being able to have questions is unacceptable,” said president Virgilio Guterres. “There may be limits for extraordinary situations where there can be no coverage, but saying explicitly that there can be no questions is against the principles of press freedom.”
The pre-tour Chinese restrictions on the Timorese media … before President Jose Ramos-Horta’s intervention. Image: Antonio Sampaio/FB
The Chinese delegation justified the decision to ban questions from journalists or to exclude from the agenda any statements with “lack of time” and the “covid-19 pandemic” excuses.
However, Ramos-Horta was also quietly supportive of the Chinese overtures in the region.
According to Sampiaio, when questioned in the media conference about fears in the West about China’s actions in the Pacific, Ramos-Horta said “there is no reason for alarm” and noted that Beijing had always had interests in the region, for example in fishing.
Timor-Leste’s President Jose Ramos-Horta with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi in Dili … “is no reason for alarm” over Chinese lobbying in the Pacific. Image: TL Presidential palace media
‘A lot of lobbying’
“These Pacific countries have done a lot of lobbying with China to get more support and China is responding to that. These one-off agreements with one country or another, they don’t affect the long-standing interests of countries like Australia and the United States,” he said.
An article by The Guardian’s Pacific Project editor Kate Lyons highlighted China’s authoritarian approach to the media this week, saying “allegations raise press freedom concerns and alarm about the ability of Pacific journalists to do their jobs, particularly as the relationship between the region and China becomes closer.”
But one of the most telling criticisms came from Fiji freelance journalist Lice Movono, whose television crew reporting for the ABC, was deliberately blocked from filming. Pacific Islands Forum officials intervened.
“From the very beginning there was a lot of secrecy, no transparency, no access given,” she told The Guardian.
“I was quite disturbed by what I saw. When you live in Fiji you kind of get used to the militarised nature of the place, but to see the Chinese officials do that was quite disturbing.
“To be a journalist in Fiji is to be worried about imprisonment all the time. Journalism is criminalised. You can be jailed or the company you work for can be fined a crippling amount that can shut down the operation … But to see foreign nationals pushing you back in your own country, that was a different level.”
Media soul-searching
Google headlines on China and Pacific media freedom. Image: Screenshot APR
China was moderately successful in signing multiple bilateral agreements with almost a dozen Pacific Island nations during Wang’s visit to the region. The tour began 11 days ago in Solomon Islands — where a secret security pact with China was leaked in March — and since then Wang has met Pacific leaders from Kiribati, Samoa, Fiji, Tonga, Niue (virtually), Cook Islands (virtually) and Vanuatu.
However, the repercussions from the visit on the media will lead to soul searching for a long time. Some brief examples of the interaction with Beijing’s authoritarianism:
Solomon Islands: The level of secrecy and selective media overtures surrounding Wang’s meetings with the government sparked the Media Association of the Solomon Islands (MASI) to call on local media to boycott coverage of the visit in protest over the “ridiculous” restrictions.
Samoa: Samoan journalist Lagipoiva Cherelle Jackson criticised the Chinese restrictions on the media with only a five-minute photo-op allowed and no questions or individual interviews. There was also no press briefing before or after Wang’s visit.
Chinese Ambassador Qian Bo’s article in the Fiji Sun on May 26. Image: China Digital Times
Examples of local media publishing propaganda were demonstrated by the pro-government Fiji Sun, with a full page “ocean of peace” op-ed written by Chinese Ambassador Qian Bo claiming China’s engagement with Pacific Island countries was “open and transparent”. The Sun followed up with report written by the Chinese embassy in Fiji touting the “great success” of Wang’s visit.
Tonga:Matangi Tonga also published an article by Chinese Ambassador Cao Xiaolin a day before Wang’s visit claiming how “China has never interfered in the internal affairs of [Pacific Island countries]” and would “adhere to openness.”
Papua New Guinea: As a joint scheduled press conference was about to start, media were told that after both ministers had spoken, only one Chinese journalist and one PNG journalist could ask a question of their own foreign minister. However, according to the ABC correspondent Natalie Whiting, when PNG Post-Courier’s Mirriam Zarriga “asked a question about the Solomons security deal, both the PNG and Chinese foreign ministers responded”.
Wang then “made a point of calling on the ABC to also ask a question”. The ABC asked about the “inability to get the 10 Pacific nations to sign on to the proposed regional deal”.
China’s Foreign Minister speaks about resetting relations with Australia as he finishes his 8 country tour of the region. Blames a “political force” in Australia that views China as a rival and its development as a threat:https://t.co/5dEde87taD#auspol#PNGpic.twitter.com/qB5Ygi2eXv
Global condemnation
The secrecy and media control surrounding Wang’s tour was roundly condemned by the Brussels-based International Federation of Journalists and Paris-based Reporters Without Borders and other media freedom watchdogs.
“The restriction of journalists and media organisations from the Chinese delegation’s visit … sets a worrying precedent for press freedom in the Pacific,” said the IFJ in a statement.
“The IFJ urges the governments of Solomon Islands and China to ensure all journalists are given fair and open access to all press events.”
Likewise, RSF’s Asia-Pacific director Daniel Bastard said the actions surrounding the events organised by the Chinese delegation with several Pacific island states “clearly contravenes the democratic principles of the region’s countries”.
He added: “We call on officials preparing to meet Wang Yi to resist Chinese pressure by allowing local journalists and international organisations to cover these events, which are of major public interest.”
University of the South Pacific journalism head Associate Professor Shailendra Singh also criticised the Chinese actions, saying “we have two different systems here. China has a different political system — a totalitarian system, and in the Pacific we have a democratic system.”
In Papua New Guinea, the last country to be visited in the Pacific before Timor-Leste, “there appeared to be little resistance” to the authoritarian screen, according to independent journalist Scott Waide, a champion of press freedom in his country.
“There’s not a lot of awareness about the visit,” he admits. “I would have liked to have seen a visible expression of resistance at least of some sort. But from Hagen, where I was this week. I didn’t see much.”
‘Problems to be resolved’
“We have problems that need to be resolved. Over the last month, I’ve tried to impart as much as possible through training workshops on the elections,” he told Pacific Media Watch But there are huge gaps in terms of journalism training. I believe that is a contributor to the lack of obvious pushback over Wang’s visit.”
The #WangYi Pacific tour reached #Fiji to tight security and a clear message that #China doesn’t welcome foreign media coverage around its officials. Were it not for Pacific media solidarity that is inclusive of ANZ press, today would have been (even more) interesting. #FijiNewspic.twitter.com/C3xwARRGuc
Reflecting on China’s Pacific tour, Lice Movono, said: “At the time of my interview with The Guardian, I think I was still pretty rattled. Now I think the best way to describe my response is that I feel extremely disturbed.”
She expressed concerns that mostly women journalists from the region noted “but that didn’t get enough traction when other media covered the incident(s) — that China was able to behave that way because the governments of the Pacific allowed it, or in the case of Fiji, preferred it that way.
Movono said that since her criticisms, she had come in for nasty attention by trolls.
“I’m getting some hateful trolling from Chinese twitter accounts – got called a ‘fat pig’ yesterday,” she told Pacific Media Watch.
“Also I’m being accused of lying because some photos have come out of the doorstop we did on the Chinese ambassador here and some have purported that to be an accurate portrayal of Chinese ‘friendliness’ toward media.”
So the pushback from President Ramos-Horta is a welcome sign for media freedom in the region.
Timor-Leste rose to 17th in the 2022 RSF World Press Freedom Index listing of 180 countries — the highest in the Pacific region — while both Fiji and Papua New Guinea fell in the rankings. There are some definite lessons there for media freedom defenders.
Frustrated Pacific journalists hope that there will be a more concerted effort to defend media freedom in the future against creeping authoritarianism.
Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has condemned a media blackout imposed on events during Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi’s 10-day tour of Pacific island countries.
Wang is today in Papua New Guinea at the end of an eight-country tour that began on May 26, but a “Chinese state media reporter is so far the only journalist to be allowed to ask him a question”, says the Paris-based global media freedom watchdog.
On the second day of his two days in Fiji this week, “the media briefing itself was run by the visiting government [and] the press passes were issued by the Chinese government,” Fiji journalist Lice Movono told The Guardian.
Movono and her cameraman, and a crew with the Australian TV broadcaster ABC, were prevented from filming a meeting between Wang and the Pacific Islands Forum’s secretary-general shortly after Wang’s arrival in Fiji the day before, although they all had accreditation.
She also observed several attempts by Chinese officials to restrict journalists’ ability to cover the event.
“From the very beginning there was a lot of secrecy, no transparency, no access given,” Movono said.
During Wang’s first stop in the Solomon Islands on May 26, covid restrictions were cited as grounds for allowing only a limited number of media outlets to attend the press conference and only two questions were allowed – one to the Solomon Islands’ foreign minister by a local reporter and one to Wang by a Chinese media outlet.
Resist Chinese pressure “The total opacity surrounding the events organised by the Chinese delegation with several Pacific island states clearly contravenes the democratic principles of the region’s countries,” said Daniel Bastard, head of RSF’s Asia-Pacific desk.
“We call on officials preparing to meet Wang Yi to resist Chinese pressure by allowing local journalists and international organisations to cover these events, which are of major public interest.”
Following the Solomon Islands, Kiribati, Samoa and Fiji, Wang visited Tonga, Vanuatu, Papua New Guinea and Timor-Leste with the same aim of signing free trade and security agreements.
RSF has previously condemned the Chinese delegation’s discrimination against local and international media during the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit held in November 2018 in Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea, with President Xi Jinping attending.
China is among the world’s worst countries for media freedom, ranked 175th out of 180 nations in the 2022 RSF World Press Freedom Index.
Pacific Media Watch collaborates with Reporters Without Borders.
The Media Association of Solomon Islands (MASI) has urged its members to boycott a media conference for a visiting Chinese delegation in protest over “ridiculous” restrictions.
China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi leads the high-level delegation which arrives in Solomon Islands today.
Wang is expected to sign a host of new agreements, including the security pact that has sparked anger in the United States, Australia and New Zealand.
MASI president Georgina Kekea said it was disappointed that the media were only allowed limited access to the visit.
Kekea said Solomon Islands was a democratic country and when media freedom was dictated on someone else’s terms, it impeded the country’s democratic principles.
“The Chinese delegation’s visit is an important and historical one for our country and our members play an important role in making sure it provides the right information and awareness on the importance of the visit to our people,” she said.
She said only two questions could be asked, one from a local journalist directed to the Solomon Islands foreign affairs minister, and one from Chinese media, directed to their foreign affairs minister.
“How ridiculous is that? If we want to interview our foreign affairs minister, we can just do it without the event,” she said.
‘What’s the purpose?’
“What is the purpose of hosting such an event for the press when they are only allowed one question and directed to their foreign minister only?”
Kekea said even the discriminatory manner in which journalists were selected to cover the event did not bode well with the association.
China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi … Pacific influencing travel includes Fiji, Kiribati, Papua New Guinea, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tonga and Vanuatu. Image: MFA/Chinese govt
“MASI thrives on professional journalism and sees no reason for journalists to be discriminated against based on who they represent. Giving credentials to selected journalists is a sign of favouritism,” she said.
“Journalists should be allowed to do their job without fear or favour.”
She said the reason given that the arrangements were done that way because of covid-19 protocols did not stack up.
“We have community transmission, people are crowded in buses, shops, markets, banks and so forth, so this is a very lame excuse,” she said.
Kekea said press freedom is enshrined as a fundamental element in the Solomons’ constitution.
‘MASI defending democracy’
“Same as the prime minister has defended democracy in Parliament after the November riots, MASI is also defending democracy in this space,” Kekea said.
She added that the boycott was not to disrespect the government or its bilateral partners in any way, but to showcase the media’s disagreement in this matter.
Solomons Islands opposition leader Mathew Wale has again raised concerns at the secrecy surrounding links with Beijing.
Wale said only a few top aides know what is in the agreements, and that there’s no justification for the secrecy.
“Solomon Islands is a democratic country, owned by the people and they are entitled to know what is being transacted in their name,” he said.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
This is not a lament for Shireen, nor is it a political article. It is not a press report, nor is it a study. It is not a tribute or condolence, because Shireen Abu Akleh deserves more than all of these.
These are mere observations and impressions of The Assassination of Shireen, of the deep sadness that has stricken people, all people, not only in Palestine, but across the world.
These are impressions of “real funerals” rather than metaphorical, of the sanctity of the casket and coffin, of the raised flags, and those that fell to the ground, of the capital and the conflict over the capital, of the tragic departure of a dear friend, an exceptional human at all levels.
I do not write this to praise her virtues, everyone has done so already, although she deserves a lot, and a lot from us.
Shireen Abu Akleh renewed Palestine and the values of the Palestinian people Shireen was insidiously and aggressively assassinated. With her martyrdom, every Palestinian felt that they had lost their own someone dear.
Shireen, who had entered every house through Al Jazeera for a quarter of a century of hard, respectful, and professional journalism, is entering houses this time as a member of every Palestinian family, in the east, west, north, and south.
Every Palestinian felt personally touched by her martyrdom, and thus felt subjugated and humiliated. Everyone is asking “how could a well-known journalist be killed in the field dressed in such a way that clearly indicates that she is a journalist: a helmet and a vest with the word ‘PRESS’?”
This act targets those who tell the truth, the truth about daily killing in Palestine.
The assassination of Shireen, turning her into news, is an Israeli attempt to hide the truth; and to discipline, intimidate, and deter those who seek to show it. However, the reaction to her murder exceeded all expectations, with hundreds of thousands of people taking to the streets to express their anger, not only in solidarity with Shireen’s small family, but because to most of them Shireen is family.
Mourners carry slain Al Jazeera veteran journalist Shireen Abu Akleh during her funeral procession in the Old City of Jerusalem on 13 May 2022. Image: Jeries Bssier/APA
This large and massive participation in the funeral is but an expression of great anger, and the retrieval of the concept of Palestine, that is still under occupation, thus the retrieval of collective values of people under occupation, the most important of which is the collective sense of the need to be rid of this occupation and end it through resistance.
With all its political and religious diversity, including diversity imposed by the Israeli occupation (West Bank, Palestinians of lands occupied in 1948, and the Gaza Strip), the Palestinian people expressed unprecedented national and on-the-ground unity.
What made this unity special is that it was not emotional or sentimental, but an extension and an accumulation of what happened in May 2021 during attacks on the Gaza Strip and Sheikh Jarrah, an extension of the great solidarity with the prisoners of the Freedom Tunnel last September.
These heroic prisoners, whose heroic and courageous actions reverberated around the whole world, are still being punished by the occupation through the murder of their siblings.
Now comes the martyrdom of Shireen Abu Akleh, which served to crown, perpetuate, and define this moment of a great unitary struggle, which will inevitably be understood in the future as a moment of continuity with the events of the past year.
Jerusalem the capital
“Jerusalem is Arab”; this is not just a slogan that the residents of the West Bank shouted near Israeli checkpoints that surround the city, which they are forbidden from entering, these are the cheers of hundreds of thousands who shouted from the walls of the Old City, and in its alleyways.
This simply means that the conflict over the city has been resolved by Palestinian and Arab consciousness, by global popular consciousness and, will of course be introduced and reintroduced, in international forums.
As for the nuclear state, with a smart, powerful, and technologically advanced, “most ethical” army, as it claims, it proceeded for six consecutive hours to confiscate Palestinian flags carried by mourners, who not only raised the Palestinian flag, but also removed Israeli flags off their flagpoles at Jaffa Gate, one of the gates of the Old City of Jerusalem.
This means that 74 years on, this “strong” state is still not able to control neighbourhoods in its capital or in “the capital”, which says a lot.
This “strong” state attempted to limit the number of mourners participating in Shireen’s funeral, and planned to implement this order, demanding that the funeral be limited to religious rites, and that mourners would not raise Palestinian flags, and thus deployed police forces to the vicinity of the (St Louis) French Hospital to tighten its control over the funeral.
This “strong” state permitted itself to do what no one in history has done, no matter their religion, and assaulted the casket in a very hideous way that will forever be engraved in people’s memories. With this assault, Israel assassinated Shireen Abu Akleh again, but in doing so, it strengthened the resolve of mourners to participate mightily in the funeral, in a manner deserving of a martyr from Palestine, and instilled in the minds of people in the entire world the most heinous picture of this occupation.
Israeli security forces attack pallbearers carrying the casket of Shireen Abu Akleh out of the St Louis French Hospital in occupied East Jerusalem’s Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood before being transported to a church and then her resting place in Jerusalem. Image: Ahmad Gharabli/AFP
The heroes: Protectors of the funeral and coffin Let’s imagine for a second the brutality with which young Jerusalemites and non-Jerusalemites who carried Shireen’s coffin on their shoulders were beaten. Let’s imagine the thick batons that the (Israeli) police used to beat them.
Let’s imagine the poisonous gasses that polluted the air of the funeral, the filthy wastewater that contaminated the area, on a sanitary level, since it was in the vicinity of a hospital, as well as on an ethical level, since it held the body of a martyr.
These heroes received batons, punches, and severe beatings, and yet held on to the coffin, they endured this much blind loathing and held on to the coffin, raised high on their shoulders, as a martyr from Palestine deserves, as Shireen Abu Akleh deserves.
The hero and heroes who saved Shatha Hanaysha and tried to save Shireen at the outskirts of the camp the moment of the crime It is not only the brutal image of the occupation and its crimes that would remain engraved in our minds, nor just the pictures of the funeral, nor just the pictures of the young men who climbed the walls of the Old City, but the pictures of the heroes who could not care less about their lives, and insisted on reaching the site of Shireen’s martyrdom, with journalist Shatha Hanaysha, whom they saved from a certain death.
They managed to take Shireen to a hospital despite the intensity of the murderers’ bullets at the site. These young men, although not fighters, have turned into heroes in everyone’s eyes. Is there an act higher than the sacrifice they have made?
Al Jazeera journalist Guevara Al Budairi bids farewell to Al Jazeera journalist Shireen Abu Akleh, who was killed during an Israeli raid in the West Bank city of Ramallah on 12 May 2022. Image: Wajed Nobani/APA
Walid, Guevara, Sandy, Wissam, Najwan, Samir, Elias and injured Ali Samoudi, as well as other al-Jazeera crew members working in Palestine
About those heartbroken by the death of a friend, colleague, sister and journalist, about their bravery to continue to report, pictures and news, despite their great loss, and about their heavy tears as they covered the news, and about their coherence in the funeral, during the burial procession, and in funeral homes.
It was as if they had agreed to postpone their grief until after they finished their duty of covering (the news) in a way that their colleague Shireen deserved. They continued their coverage for five days, covering not only the funeral route and the ceremony, but also the news of Palestine — specifically, the raids against the Jenin refugee camp on the day of the funeral.
Iman, Manal, Wasim, Carol, Jamal, Michael, Nadia, Nay, Marian, Rita, Malak, Faten, Fouad, Haitham, and other close friends All of these friends concurred that Shireen had honoured them with her friendship, and that their loss was great and very painful; to Shireen they were family, and at the same time Shireen was family to them.
The impact of her loss was enormous, a great silence ensued, and their eyes reflected the entire sadness of this tragedy. But the determination of Shireen’s colleagues and friends to take part in her farewell from Jenin to Jerusalem, through all the cities and towns, to commemorate her, and the continued talk of her, gave them the strength to cope with the shock of her departure.
Her brother Antoine, his wife Lisa, son Nasri and daughters Lena and Larrain Antoine, the brother who received the news of his sister Shireen’s injury, and then her martyrdom, via breaking news thousands of miles away from Palestine, for him to begin the risky return journey from Somalia, where he works with the United Nations, which was under complete closure due to general elections, he had to travel most of the distance to the airport on foot and reached it without a ticket or any preparation to travel in the times of covid-19 and its procedures.
On board, he saw everything happening in Palestine, he saw the Israeli police storming his home in Beit Hanina, he had to experience a thousand thoughts all while also experiencing this overwhelming sadness.
An only brother loses his only sister, his two daughters and son lost their only aunt, they were deprived of an aunt; Antoine’s wife, Lisa, lost her sister-in-law, her friend and her sister. What brutality is this?
What consoles Antoine, Lisa and their children is that Shireen regained the Arabism of Jerusalem, she united Palestinians, restored the spirit of international solidarity with Palestine, and redirected the compass to its rightful place.
Shireen conjured Palestine up with her death, and this may be a consolation for her small family and for all of us.
Finally, the murderer’s narrative Shireen’s greatest passion was to expose the crimes of the Israeli occupation in Palestine, and through her work as a journalist, she exposed murders, confiscations, Judaisation, repression, and racial discrimination. She was always face-to-face with the Zionist narrative, exposing its lies and claims.
I do not want to go into the mazes of the investigation, nor the identity of who is behind the murderer, or the justifications they gave to media, let alone their ghastly confusion, their attempt to confuse the world’s public opinion in turn, the ensuing obfuscation, and so on.
There is a known murderer with a name and a commander, the commander has a higher commander, and the higher commander reports to a political official, all of whom decided on the 11 May 2022 to continue to shed Palestinian blood.
Those behind the crime are the occupation authorities who sent their special forces to practice what they do best: killing Palestinians wherever they are, regardless of profession.
Over time, the occupation has killed journalists, lawyers, doctors, children, young men, and women, without being prevented by any taboos.
I repeat that there is a known murderer, and when the occupation ceases to carry out daily killings in villages, cities and refugee camps in Palestine, it will lose its raison d’être.
The departure of journalist Shireen Abu Akleh entails a lot of work that the Palestinian Authority and Palestinian and international human rights institutions have to do to expose the practices of this occupation.
The forces of political and civil society have a lot of burdens to bear in order to maintain the momentum of solidarity that the departure of martyr Abu Akleh has left, an unprecedented international solidarity that must be preserved, observed, developed, and supported.
Khaled Farraj is the director-general of the Institute for Palestine Studies. This article was first published by the Institute for Palestine Studies on 17 May 2022 and has been translated for Mondoweiss and republished with their permission. Translated by Nina Abu Farha.
Nothing justifies the killing of Al Jazeera journalist Shireen Abu Akleh and the wounding of her colleague Ali al-Samoudi during an Israeli raid on Jenin in the Occupied West Bank. Nothing.
I believe the renowned reporter died at the hands of Israeli armed forces and that she was deliberately targeted because she was a journalist, easily identified by the word PRESS on the flak jacket and helmet that did not protect her from the shot that killed her. Her wounded colleague was identically dressed.
I am left in no doubt about the culpability of the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) on a number of grounds.
Several eyewitnesses, including an Agence France-Presse photographer and another Al Jazeera staffer, were adamant that there was no shooting from Palestinians near the scene of the killing. Shatha Hanaysha, the Al Jazeera journalist who had been standing next to Abu Akleh against a high wall when firing broke out, stated they were deliberately targeted by Israeli troops.
Israeli spokesmen who initially laid the blame on Palestinian militants became more equivocal in the face of the eyewitness accounts, although they would go no further than saying she could have been accidentally shot from an armoured vehicle by an Israeli soldier.
That is about as close to an admission of guilt as the IDF is likely to get.
However, perhaps the strongest evidence of IDF culpability is the fact that the killing of Abu Akleh is part of a pattern of targeting journalists. Reporters Without Borders — which has called for an independent international investigation of the death that it says is a violation of international conventions that protect journalists — says two Palestinian journalists were killed by Israeli snipers in 2018 and since then more than 140 journalists have been the victims of violations by the Israeli security forces.
30 journalists killed since 2000
By its tally, at least 30 journalists have been killed since 2000.
Of course, those deaths are but one consequence of the IDF’s disproportionate response — in terms of the number of victims — to actions by Palestinian militants over the occupation of the West Bank. Since the present Israeli government took office last year, 76 Palestinians have died at the hands of Israeli forces.
There has been condemnation of such deaths, particularly when they include a number of children. So the reaction to the killing of Shireen Abu Akleh was sadly predictable. In other circumstances the outcry would dissipate and Israeli forces would continue to carry out their government’s wishes.
However, three things may make the condemnation louder, longer and more effective.
First was the fact that, although she was born in Jerusalem, she was a United States citizen. This could well explain the US Administration’s statement condemning the killing and its willingness to back a similarly reproachful UN Security Council resolution.
The second factor was that, although a Palestinian, Abu Akleh was not a Muslim. She was raised in a Christian Catholic family. It may not be a particularly becoming trait but the ability of the West to identify with a victim affects the way in which it reacts.
However, it is the third factor that may have the most telling effect on the long-term consequences of her death. I am referring to the desecration of her funeral by baton-wielding armed Israeli police.
Pallbearers assaulted by police
The journalist’s coffin was carried in procession from an East Jerusalem hospital to the Cathedral of the Annunciation of the Virgin in the Christian Quarter of the Old City where a service was held before burial in a cemetery on the Mount of Olives. However, shortly after the pallbearers left the hospital the procession — waving Palestinian flags and chanting — was assaulted by police.
It is the third factor that may have the most telling effect on the long-term consequences of Palestinian journalist Shireen Abu Akleh’s death … the desecration of her funeral by baton-wielding armed Israeli police. Image: Al Jazeera screenshot APR
Mourners were hit with batons, stun grenades were detonated, and a phalanx of armed police in riot gear advanced on the coffin. The procession scattered in disarray and, as the pallbearers tried to avoid the police action, the coffin tilted almost vertical and was in danger of falling to the road.
At that point, an Al Jazeera journalist providing commentary on live coverage of the funeral said an an anguished voice: “Oh my God. Such disrespect for the dead, for those mourning the dead. How is that a security threat? How is that disorderly? Why does it require this kind of reaction, this level of violence on the part of the Israelis?”
Why did the police act as they did? Apparently because it is illegal to display the Palestinian flag and chant Palestinian slogans. Even after Abu Akleh’s coffin was transferred to a vehicle, police ran alongside to tear Palestinian flag from the windows.
The message was clear: There was no contrition on the part of Israeli authorities for the death of the Al Jazeera journalist. The justification for the police action was pathetic. There were lame excuses that stones had been thrown at them. In other words, it was business as usual.
That may not be the way the world sees it. Nor, indeed, the way it may be seen by many ordinary Israelis who would have been affronted by the indignity shown to the remains of a widely respected woman who died doing her job.
‘Time for some accountability?’
Yaakov Katz, the editor of the Jerusalem Post, an English-language Israeli newspaper, said on Twitter: “What’s happening at Abu Akleh’s funeral is terrible. This is a failure on all fronts.” In a later message he asked: “Is it not time for some accountability?”
The targeting of journalists aims to intimidate and to prevent them from bearing witness, particularly where authorities have something to hide. That is why, for example, we have seen seven journalists killed in Ukraine, 12 of their colleagues injured by gunfire, and multiple reports of clearly identified journalists coming under fire from Russian forces.
One might have thought the international community — and in particular Israel’s close friend the United States — would have put significant pressure on Tel Aviv to cease such intimidation a year ago after Israeli aircraft bombed the Gaza City building that was home to various media organisations including Al Jazeera and the US wire service Associated Press.
Israel claimed, without any evidence and contrary to AP’s own knowledge, that the building was being used by Hamas, the Palestinian nationalist organisation.
Associated Press chief executive Gary Pruitt said after that attack that “the world will know less about what is happening in Gaza because of what happened today”. Aidan White, founder of the Ethical Journalism Network described the bombing as a “catastrophic attempt to shut down media, to silence criticism, and worst of all, to create a cloak of secrecy”.
That, no doubt, was what Tel Aviv intended.
Yet there were no recriminations sufficient to change the course Tel Aviv was on. As the killing of Shireen Abu Akleh so tragically illustrates, Israel has continued its policy of intimidation and violence against journalists.
Sooner or later, it will come to realise that such actions diminish a government in the eyes of the world. The death of Abu Akleh and the indignity shown to her remains have added significantly to the damage to its reputation.
Dr Gavin Ellis holds a PhD in political studies. He is a media consultant and researcher. A former editor-in-chief of The New Zealand Herald, he has a background in journalism and communications — covering both editorial and management roles — that spans more than half a century. Dr Ellis publishes a website called Knightly Views where this commentary was first published and it is republished by Asia Pacific Report with permission.
The targeting of journalists aims to intimidate and to prevent them from bearing witness, particularly where authorities have something to hide … One of the images of slain journalist Shireen Abu Akleh shown in a “guerilla-projection” by a pro-Palestinian group at Te Papa yesterday to mark the 74th anniversary of the Nakba, the forced expulsion of Palestinians from their homeland in 1948. Image: Stuff screenshot APR
Israel’s fatal shooting of leading Al Jazeera reporter Shireen Abu Akleh as she covered clashes in the West Bank city of Jenin is a serious violation of the Geneva Conventions and UN Security Council Resolution 2222 on the protection of journalists, says the Paris-based media freedom watchdog Reporters Without Borders (RSF).
It has called for an independent international investigation into her death as soon as possible.
Witnesses said Abu Akleh, a Palestinian American, was killed by a shot to the head although she was wearing a bulletproof vest with the word “PRESS” that clearly identified her as a journalist.
Ali al-Samudi, a Palestinian journalist working as an Al Jazeera producer who was beside her at the time, was also targeted, sustaining a gunshot wound in the back, RSF reported.
Samudi, who is now in hospital, said in a video: “We were filming. They did not ask us to stop filming or to leave. They fired a shot that hit me and another shot that killed Shireen in cold blood.”
Following Abu Akleh’s death, Israeli security forces raided her East Jerusalem home as her family was making arrangements for her funeral.
Her body was transferred to Nablus for an autopsy prior to be taken to Jerusalem, where her funeral took place yesterday in emotional scenes with massive crowds. She was buried beside her parents in Mount Zion.
Israeli riot police attacked the pallbearers and a hearse carrying her coffin in the peaceful march, and ripped away Palestinian flags. International protests have followed this latest attack.
Popular in Middle East
Abu Akleh was very popular in the Middle East and was respected by fellow journalists for her experience in the field.
Al Jazeera issued a statement accusing the Israeli security forces of “deliberately” targeting Abu Akleh and of killing her “in cold blood.”
Palestinian American journalist Shireen Abu Akleh … assassinated in “cold blood” in Jenin. Image: AJ screenshot APR
The Israel Defence Forces announced an investigation into her death, but IDF spokesman Amnon Shefler said Israeli soldiers “would never deliberately target non-combatants”.
Several witnesses, including an AFP photographer, denied seeing any armed Palestinians at the place where Abu Akleh was killed. Palestinian Authority president Mahmoud Abbas said he held the Israeli authorities “fully responsible” for her death.
“RSF is not satisfied with Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid’s proposal of a joint investigation into this journalist’s death,” said RSF secretary-general Christophe Deloire.
“An independent international investigation must be launched as soon as possible.”
The shooting of these two Palestinian reporters during an IDF “anti-terrorist operation” in Jenin is the latest of many disturbing cases.
Two journalists fatally shot
In the spring of 2018, two Palestinian journalists were fatally shot by Israeli snipers while covering the weekly “Great March of Return” protests near the Israeli border in the Gaza Strip.
Also in 2018, Ain Media founder Yaser Murtaja was killed on the spot on March 30, while Radio Sawt al Shabab reporter Ahmed Abu Hussein died in hospital on April 25 from the gunshot injury he suffered on April 13.
According to RSF’s tallies, more than 140 journalists have been the victims of violations by the Israeli security forces on Friday’s marches since 2018, and at least 30 journalists have been killed since 2000.
And now they won’t even let one of Palestine’s giants in journalism have a dignified and peaceful funeral — all in plain sight. (There’s a reason Reporters Without Borders ranks Israel 86th in Press Freedom.) https://t.co/y8SLL1qY7P
Fiji has been ranked as the worst place in the Pacific region for journalists in the latest assessment by the global press freedom watchdog Reporters Without Borders (RSF).
RSF changed its system of analysis this year to include a breakdown on specific categories such as legal framework and justice system, technological censorship and surveillance, disinformation and propaganda, arbitrary detention and proceedings, independence and pluralism, models and good practices, media sustainability, and violence against journalists, which partially explains Fiji’s sudden fall on the Index.
RSF said Aotearoa New Zealand, which received an overall score of 83.54, was a “regional model” for press freedom “by having developed safeguards against political and economic influences” for journalists to conduct their work.
The yearly report was released to coincide with last week’s World Press Freedom Day on May 3.
Media decree, sedition laws It said Fiji operated under the 2010 Media Industry Development Decree, which became law in 2018.
RSF said in an earlier report that the sedition laws in Fiji, with penalties of up to seven years in prison, were also used to foster a climate of fear and self-censorship.
“Sedition charges put the lives of three journalists with The Fiji Times, the leading daily, on hold until they were finally acquitted in 2018,” the report stated.
“Many observers believed it was the price the newspaper paid for its independence.”
Fiji has no place for a partisan media using press freedom as a blank cheque to be a mouthpiece of government, says opposition National Federation Party leader Professor Biman Prasad.
In a statement to mark World Press Freedom Day last week, Professor Prasad urged journalists to be fearless and amplify the truth and voice of the people at all times.
He said it was critically important for the media to be impartial and to amplify the voice of the people without fear — especially in an election year.
“Since September last year, the media, particularly The Fiji Times and Communications Fiji Ltd, operators of five radio stations and the vastly popular FijiVillage news site, have been repeatedly criticised by government for amplifying the voice of the people through their elected representatives,” he said.
“The Fiji Times and CFL are simply doing what any media organisation should do at all times. They are simply performing their fundamental role as an effective watchdog of government.
“They are the messenger of truth, but unfortunately the truth is unpalatable to the current government because its broken promises and failed policies that are severely hurting the people, are being exposed.
“The Attorney-General’s statement in Parliament on September 24 last year, while agreeing to the tirade against The Fiji Times and CFL by Assistant Minister Selai Adimaitoga for the media to declare which political party they support in their editorial policy, is the clearest indication of government preferring a pro-FijiFirst and partisan media in the country.
‘Freedom of expression’ right
“Instead, government must fully adhere to Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights which states, ‘Everyone has right to freedom of opinion and expression’.
“This right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through the media regardless of frontiers.
“This freedom and right are reposed in the people, which the state and politicians must respect at all times.
“Therefore, it is totally wrong and unethical for government or anyone to launch a tirade against the media organisation and their news director or editor-in-chief just because they don’t like the media amplifying the truth and voice of the people without fear.
“Do the right thing – shoot the message, not the messenger.”
MIDA Act ‘dangerous’ for Fiji media
Meanwhile, Pacific Media Watch reports that the Fijian Media Association (FMA) issued a statement welcoming the Reporters Without Borders (RSF) 2022 World Press Freedom Index, in which Fiji’s ranking slipped by 47 places to 102nd in 180 countries. RSF criticised the legislation in Fiji that “criminalised” journalism.
The statement said that while the Fiji media was under pressure “the Fijian media remains bold and thriving, and committed to fulfil its role”.
“Who defines what is against the public interest or what is against the national interest?” asked the statement by general secretary Stanley Simpson.
“While the Fijian media have been doing their best to be bold and free and abiding by their code of ethics — these laws are making many organisations and editors hesitate about publishing or broadcasting certain views that may go against the government based on how [it] may interpret that legislation and come after a media organisation.
“The fines are too excessive and designed to be vindictive and punish the media rather [than] encourage better reporting standards and be corrective.
“Media organisations are almost unanimous in seeking removal of the harsh fines and a review of the Act [Media Industry Development Authority (MIDA) Act].
“It is dangerous for media freedom now and also in the future. The MIDA Act has been ineffective and has done little to nothing to raise media standards,” the FMA statement said.
RSF changed its system of analysis this year to include a breakdown on specific categories such as legal framework and justice system, technological censorship and surveillance, disinformation and propaganda, arbitrary detention and proceedings, independence and pluralism, models and good practices, media sustainability, and violence against journalists, which partially explains Fiji’s sudden major fall on the Index.
Luke Naceiis a Fiji Times reporter. Republished with permission and additional reporting by Pacific Media Watch.
Fiji’s use of legislation to criminalise the work of journalists who publicise “contrary to the public or national interest” is a term that is poorly defined, says Reporters Without Borders (RSF) in its 2022 Press Freedom Index.
The Paris-based global media freedom watchdog said journalists in Fiji continued to face the threat of heavy fines or imprisonment for publishing material “contrary to the public or national interest”.
“Journalists’ interests are represented by the Fiji Media Association (FMA), which often criticises the government’s harassment of the media,” RSF said.
“Journalists face the threat of heavy fines or imprisonment for publishing material ‘contrary to the public or national interest,’ a term that is poorly defined in the law.
“Against this backdrop, many journalists must think twice before publishing content critical of the authorities.”
RSF said press freedom in Fiji had been affected since the 2006 coup.
Some MP support for press freedom
“Some politicians, such as National Federation Party leader Professor Biman Prasad, have shown their support for a free press.”
RSF stated the Media Industry Development Act and the Media Industry Development Authority (MIDA) were directly linked to the government.
“Journalists can be jailed for up to two years for violating this law’s vaguely worded provisions.
“The sedition laws, which have repeatedly been misused against The Fiji Times, also fuel a climate of fear and self-censorship thanks to penalties of up to seven years in prison.”
RSF says authorities use “discriminatory advertising practices” by withholding advertisements and legal notices from those regarded as critical of the government.
RSF changed its system of analysis this year to include a breakdown on specific categories such as legal framework and justice system, technological censorship and surveillance, disinformation and propaganda, arbitrary detention and proceedings, independence and pluralism, models and good practices, media sustainability, and violence against journalists which partially explains Fiji’s sudden fall on the Index.
Questions sent to the Attorney-General, Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum, on the statements made by RSF remain unanswered.
Anish Chandis a Fiji Times journalist. Republished with permission.
A senior Papua New Guinea journalist says an ongoing dispute between journalists and management at television broadcaster EMTV is starving the country’s provinces of news.
Former Lae regional head of news Scott Waide said the station was failing to provide a proper nationwide news service after its news team had been sacked over a dispute with EMTV’s management.
“What it’s done is effectively cut off public access to information in all the provinces,” he said.
“The media is supposed to be a conduit between government and people that’s not happening anymore.”
EMTV’s news team were sacked in March over the coverage of the controversial Australian hotel businessman Jamie Pang, who was convicted of a number of criminal charges.
Waide said the sacked staff were making moves to win their jobs back in the courts, but in the meantime they had set up alternative coverage online.
“They’ve established, registered a company called Inside PNG. It is already an online news service with a website and social media presence. And they’ll be working towards covering the elections in June,” he said.
Prianka Srinivasanreports for ABC Radio Australia. Republished with permission.
“As a cross-party group of parliamentarians of the German Bundestag, we have the honor to reach out to you, and to ask for your attention in a case that is currently of great concern to us, knowing that we share a mutual concern for the protection as well as the implementation of internationally recognized human rights. We have closely followed the fate of Julian Assange in the past; however, the current developments in his case arouse our concern all the more.”
A Melbourne-based Indonesian media academic has warned that declining media freedom in Australia is undermining the country’s ability to project liberal democratic values to the Asia-Pacific region.
“Many people who have been watching media and journalism in Australia have been worried,” Tito Ambyo, a journalism lecturer at RMIT, told ABC News.
He said governments in Australia needed “to start seeing journalists as an important part of democracy”.
“We don’t have journalists being killed or imprisoned in Australia, but we have seen a lot of abuses,” he said, pointing to online harassment that was “often racist or gendered in nature”.
Ambyo was responding to the 2022 World Press Freedom Index released this week by the Paris-based media freedom watchdog Reporters Without Borders which reported a big slump in media freedoms in Australia.
Media freedom in Australia is “fragile” and less protected than in New Zealand and several emerging democracies in Asia, RSF concluded in its annual Index. The assessment measures have become more comprehensive in changes introduced this year.
Australia slid from 25 to 39 in the Index, ranking below New Zealand in 11th place and Timor-Leste at number 17, but above Samoa (45th), Tonga (49th), Papua New Guinea (62nd) and Fiji (102nd) — with both the latter Pacific countries experiencing big falls while facing elections this year.
Taiwan, which has transitioned from a military dictatorship to a liberal democracy since the late 1980s, ranked just above Australia at 38th.
The Press Freedom Index, which assesses the state of journalism in 180 countries and territories, highlights the disastrous effects of news and information chaos — the effects of a globalised and unregulated online information space that encourages fake news and propaganda.
‘Fox News model’
Within democratic societies, divisions are growing as a result of the spread of opinion media following the “Fox News model” and the spread of disinformation circuits that are amplified by the way social media functions.
At the international level, democracies are being weakened by the asymmetry between open societies and despotic regimes that control their media and online platforms while waging propaganda wars against democracies.
Polarisation on these two levels is fuelling increased tension, says RSF.
The invasion of Ukraine (106th) by Russia (155th) at the end of February reflects this process, as the physical conflict was preceded by a propaganda war.
China (175th), one of the world’s most repressive autocratic regimes, uses its legislative arsenal to confine its population and cut it off from the rest of the world, especially the population of Hong Kong (148th), which has plummeted in the Index.
Confrontation between “blocs” is growing, as seen between nationalist Narendra Modi’s India (150th) and Pakistan (157th). The lack of press freedom in the Middle East continues to impact the conflict between Israel (86th), Palestine (170th) and the Arab states.
Media polarisation is feeding and reinforcing internal social divisions in democratic societies such as the United States (42nd), despite President Joe Biden’s election, reports RSF.
Social media tensions
The increase in social and political tension is being fuelled by social media and new opinion media, especially in France (26th).
The suppression of independent media is contributing to a sharp polarisation in “illiberal democracies” such as Poland (66th), where the authorities have consolidated their control over public broadcasting and their strategy of “re-Polonising” the privately-owned media.
The trio of Nordic countries at the top of the Index — Norway, Denmark and Sweden — continues to serve as a democratic model where freedom of expression flourishes, while Moldova (40th) and Bulgaria (91st) stand out this year thanks to a government change and the hope it has brought for improvement in the situation for journalists even if oligarchs still own or control the media.
The situation is classified as “very bad” in a record number of 28 countries in this year’s Index, while 12 countries, including Belarus (153rd) and Russia (155th), are on the Index’s red list (indicating “very bad” press freedom situations) on the map.
The world’s 10 worst countries for press freedom include Myanmar (176th), where the February 2021 coup d’état set press freedom back by 10 years, as well as China, Turkmenistan (177th), Iran (178th), Eritrea (179th) and North Korea (180th).
Fatal danger for democracies
“Margarita Simonyan, the editor-in-chief of RT (the former Russia Today), revealed what she really thinks in a Russia One TV broadcast when she said, ‘no great nation can exist without control over information,’ said RSF secretary-general Christophe Deloire.
“The creation of media weaponry in authoritarian countries eliminates their citizens’ right to information but is also linked to the rise in international tension, which can lead to the worst kind of wars.
“Domestically, the ‘Fox News-isation’ of the media poses a fatal danger for democracies because it undermines the basis of civil harmony and tolerant public debate,” he said.
“Urgent decisions are needed in response to these issues, promoting a New Deal for Journalism, as proposed by the Forum on Information and Democracy, and adopting an appropriate legal framework, with a system to protect democratic online information spaces.”
Pacific Media Watch collaborates with Reporters Without Borders.
The next Australian government must recommit to press freedom by putting in place overdue reforms to support public interest journalism, says the union for Australia’s media workers.
On World Press Freedom Day, the Media, Entertainment and Arts Alliance is calling on all political parties to act on a range of reforms that are needed to ensure journalists can continue to perform their essential work finding facts, seeking the truth and holding power to account.
MEAA media federal president Karen Percy said the role of public interest journalism in a democratic society had been highlighted by the covid-19 pandemic, when there has been confusion and debate about what is true and what is false, often exploited by deliberate disinformation campaigns.
“We know from the covid-19 pandemic that the work of journalists saves lives, informs the public, improves public policy and holds the powerful to account,” Percy said in a statement.
“But we’ve also witnessed how people have been confused about what is true and what is false with their vulnerabilities exploited by those pushing disinformation campaigns.
“Australians have relied on journalists to accurately and impartially convey important information, but our jobs have been made all the more difficult when governments suppress information, refuse to answer questions, hide information under the pretext of national security, and when defamation laws are used to quash accountability.
“So, on World Press Freedom Day 2022, it is timely to call for our political leaders — and those aspiring to lead us — to respect and honour public interest journalism, to put accountability and transparency at the heart of our democracy.
“Because without a free press, democracy dies.”
With the federal election underway, MEAA has submitted to the major parties our key priorities for reform to protect media freedom and support public interest journalism.
Among the reforms that are needed are:
• Boosting the Public Interest News Gathering (PING) programme for a minimum of three years with $150 million per annum available to the small and medium news sectors, with substantial funds quarantined for providers of regional news services.
• Restoration of adequate funding to public broadcasters the ABC and SBS, with greater certainty over a five-year funding cycle.
• Implementing reforms to protect whistle blowers who disclose confidential information to media in the public interest.
• Conducting an urgent review of Australia’s security laws to remove impediments and sanctions against public interest journalism.
• Harmonising journalism shield laws across all national, state and territory jurisdictions to protect journalists from identifying sources.
• Introduce new provisions to ensure that any future media mergers meet a “diversity of voices” test before they are approved by government regulators.
• Financial reforms to enable the costs of journalism to be offset via taxation incentives.
• Increasing international advocacy in support of journalists and allied workers when they are exposed to arbitrary detention, imprisonment and threats to their life, and adopting the International Federation of Journalists’ International Convention on the Safety and Independence of Journalists and Other Media Professionals.
The report examines the impact of covid-related disinformation campaigns on journalism and press freedom, including increases in violent attacks, harassment and threats against journalists.
Nobel laureates José Ramos-Horta and Maria Ressa have urged Southeast Asians to keep working toward a better region where democratic freedoms are protected in lecture leading into World Press Freedom Day on May 3.
Nobel laureates José Ramos-Horta and Maria Ressa have called on Southeast Asians to fight for democracy and continue demanding human rights amid growing threats to democratic freedoms in the region.
Ramos-Horta, a longtime politician and independence leader in Timor-Leste, along with Ressa, veteran journalist and co-founder of Rappler, made the statements in an online lecture titled “Freedom in Southeast Asia” last Tuesday.
The discussion centred on ethical issues and the future of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) in the areas of governing democracy, human rights, freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and social media.
“We have to keep fighting to improve democracy, perfect democracy as we have been fighting for decades, continue understanding that there will be setbacks, there will be triumphs for democracy again,” Ramos-Horta said.
Ramos-Horta, one of East Timor’s best known political figures, was also president from 2007 to 2012, and prime minister and foreign minister before that.
Ramos-Horta said part of the reason he decided to run for public office again was inadequate government response to crises like the covid-19 pandemic. The president-elect said he would work to respond to global economic pressures, including supply chain issues stemming from the Russia-Ukraine war and covid-19 lockdowns in China.
‘Demand good governance’
“Don’t lose sight of what is important. Fight, but fight not with radicalism but fight with brains, wisdom, and a great deal of humility,” Ramos-Horta said.
Ressa, who covered Ramos-Horta as a journalist, echoed this call, saying that people in Southeast Asia “must continue demanding our rights and demanding good governance.”
“Our public officials need to realize that in the end, their struggle for power should not impede on the ability to deliver what their citizens need,” she said.
The full media freedom lecture. Video: Rappler
‘Enlightened self-interest’ Ressa, who has reported on democracy movements in Southeast Asia, said ASEAN has not been able to live up to its promises since it was founded in 1967. While advances have been made, the fight to protect democracy, she said, faces steeper challenges, including the use of social media platforms to spread lies and hate.
Ressa challenged leaders and the public to practice “enlightened self-interest” in an effort to foster a code of ethics that could push back against corruption and abuse.
Nobel Peace laureate Maria Ressa … “I can distill almost everything wrong into two words: power and money – and how do you put guardrails around the people who have that?. Image: RSF
“I can distill almost everything wrong into two words: power and money – and how do you put guardrails around the people who have that? Ethics, rules-based [order], and they themselves limit themselves because there is a greater good. This is not just ASEAN, it is universal,” she said.
In fighting for democracy in the region, the Rappler co-founder also urged young people to first think of what they consider important and what freedoms they are willing to fight for.
She said: “Because of social media, democracy now is a person-to-person battle for integrity. And so the question for you is, where do you draw the line?
“How well will you give up some of your power to others in order to have a better world? What kind of leader not only do you want, but what kind of leader do you want to be?”
Ramos-Horta reminded the public to “live up to the responsibility” the region has in Myanmar, where a military coup plunged the country into turmoil, derailing a decade of democratic reforms and economic gain.
Expected to join ASEAN
Ramos-Horta earlier said he expected Timor-Leste to become the 11th member of the ASEAN “within this year or next year at the latest.” It currently holds observer status in the bloc – and also observer status with the Pacific Islands Forum.
“The message to the young people: You want a better Southeast Asia? You want a better region, better community that is generous, embracing of everyone because Southeast Asia is extraordinarily rich in diversity – and that makes Southeast Asia unique – then fight for it,” he said.
“Do not abandon the people of Myanmar who feel completely abandoned. That is the absolute priority for us in Southeast Asia,” he added.
Sofia Tomacruzis a Rappler reporter. Republished with permission.
Ministers have been accused of dragging their feet over opening up a controversial Government “clearing house” for dealing with Freedom of Information (FOI) requests to scrutiny.
The Commons Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee said it was “unacceptable” that a promised internal review by the Cabinet Office had yet to take place.
The committee said the Cabinet Office had failed to provide a convincing explanation as to why it turned down a request by the Information Commissioner’s Office to conduct an audit of its operations.
And it said its own investigations had found evidence of “poor FOI administration” in the Cabinet Office and which appeared “inconsistent with the spirit and principles” of the FOI Act.
Blacklists?
The Cabinet Office has previously denied the clearing house – which co-ordinates Whitehall’s response to certain FOI requests – was used to blacklist some information seekers, including some journalists.
However, a tribunal ruling in April 2021 required the Government to release information about its operations, citing a “profound lack of transparency” about what it does.
Prior to that, the committee said the clearing house had “an opaque status”.
Following the ruling, the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) made a request to carry out an audit of the clearing house’s operations but was turned down – a decision the committee said was “misjudged”.
Instead the Cabinet Office announced it would conduct a short internal review but has yet to say who will conduct it or what their terms of reference will be.
The committee said:
This is an unacceptable delay. From the limited amount we know, the suggested direction of the review’s terms of reference lacks the same depth as the ICO’s proposed FOI audit approach.
To reassure the public and this committee, we recommend that the Cabinet Office should instead expose itself to rigorous external third-party scrutiny from the ICO and accept the ICO’s offer of an audit.
As the lead department in Whitehall on FOI, the committee said it was important the Cabinet Office was held to a higher standard to ensure “a vibrant FOI culture across government”.
Withholding information
Instead, however, there was evidence suggesting that, up to 2019 at least, the Cabinet Office granted fewer FOI requests and withheld more information than other departments.
Committee chairman William Wragg said:
Our Freedom of Information laws are a crucial part of our democracy, allowing citizens to hold government to account.
As FoI policy owner and coordinating department, the Cabinet Office should be championing transparency across government, but its substandard FoI handling and failure to provide basic information about the working of the coordinating body has had the opposite effect.
The Canary’s own journalists have repeatedly found the FOI system to not be fit for purpose. Indeed, in an investigation from last year, the Home Office told our journalist:
This FOI request shows that we do respond to queries from The Canary but that there have been occasions where press officers have not done so.
Civil servants must act with impartiality and must not act in a way that unjustifiably favours or discriminates against particular news media. We have reminded our media officers of that obligation.
Wragg continued:
An internal review alone won’t be sufficient to restore trust. The Government must go further and allow for an independent audit of its practices such as the one offered by the Information Commissioner.
The Cabinet Office has dragged its feet for too long on this issue and must act now to remove suspicion around the clearing house, improve compliance with FoI laws and regain public confidence.
Oiwan Lam on 26 April 2022 reported that Hong Kong’s Foreign Correspondents’ Club has canceled its Human Rights Awards for fear of “legal risks”
Image created by Oiwan Lam.
The Foreign Correspondents’ Club, Hong Kong (FCC HK), a press freedom watchdog, announced they would cancel their 2022 Human Rights Press Awards (HRPA) on April 25. Eight members of the Club’s Press Freedom Committee have resigned in protest over the decision.
Many foreign correspondents were shocked by the decision. Launched in 1995, the HRPA has been one of the most important platforms to celebrate and honour human rights journalism from around Asia. The Club normally announces the winners on May 3, World Press Freedom Day.
Hong Kong Free Press (HKFP) quoted sources from FCC HK that the cancellation was related to the legal risks in presenting awards to the now-defunct Stand News. Two former senior staff members of the independent news outlet have been charged with conspiring to publish “seditious publications” pending trial.
Stand News was forced to shut down last December after security police raided its office. The police authorities accused the news site of publishing “seditious materials” with the intent to cause hatred towards the government and the judiciary.
An FCC member told the HKFP that Stand News would receive four awards and five merits in this year’s award, but “certain items” would pose a legal risk.
In a letter to the Club’s members, the president of FCC HK Keith Richburg said the decision was made in the organization’s board meeting on April 23:
Over the last two years, journalists in Hong Kong have been operating under new “red lines” on what is and is not permissible, but there remain significant areas of uncertainty and we do not wish unintentionally to violate the law. This is the context in which we decided to suspend the Awards.
The letter also says that “recent developments might also require changes to our [FCC HK’s] approach” in the promotion of press freedom.
As the city’s incoming Chief Executive John Lee has vowed to apply the “strictest measures” to clamp down on “anyone who tries to use journalistic work as a shield to engage in crimes endangering national security” in response to the crackdown on Apple Daily, FCC HK’s anticipation of legal risks is valid.
Yet, as a press freedom watchdog, many see the choice to ax the awards as an act of self-censorship antithetical to the organization’s purpose, as independent journalist Ilaria Maria Sala wrote on Twitter:
Two foreign journalists arrested by the Iraqi Army are now in police custody in Baghdad, according to reports. Named as Marlene F. and Matej K., the pair were detained by the army on Wednesday 20 April. The arrests took place near the Yazidi settlement of Şengal in northern Iraq.
But Kurdish news website ANF claims no reasons had been given for the arrests.
Threatened
Marlene F. and Matej K. had been researching the Yazidi community. ANF reported Kurdish sources which said the arrests had taken place despite the pair declaring themselves as journalists:
By their own account, Marlene F. And Matej K. have been in Şengal for a few months for research into social settings in the Yazidi community in Şengal. According to Civaka Azad, they were conducting conversations with representatives of different civil organizations and regional institutions.
Reports say they were searched and threatened, and their phones and bags were seized. The arrests came during tensions between the Iraqi military and militia units, according to ANF:
At the beginning of the week, tensions between Yazidi defense forces and Iraqi troops had escalated. There were combats as a result of attacks on the positions of the YBŞ, the Yazidi women units YJŞ and Asayîşa Êzîdxanê.
Open letter
Marlene F.’s parents signed an open letter to German foreign minister Annalena Baerbock calling for the reporters to be released. The letter said that freedom of the press was “not a luxury”.
Additionally, they said the journalists were interested in the the Yazidi people and want to:
contribute to the demand and the right of the Yazidi population to self-determination being heard worldwide.
Reporters Without Borders puts Iraq at 163rd place on their press freedom index. Kurdish journalists have warned about an assault on press freedom. Reporter Omed Baroshsky was released from jail in February. Imprisoned in 2020 over social media posts critical of the authorities, Baroshky served 18 months in prison. Press freedom in the region, he told the Committee to Protect Journalists, was an “illusion”.
As The Canary has reported, Yazidis suffered genocidal brutality under ISIS rule and now face repression from nearby Turkey.
BREAKING
