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Al-Jazeera: the authorities have closed the station for 30 days

The Iraq prime minister's decision to throw al-Jazeera out of Baghdad and ban it from operating for 30 days is "a serious blow to press freedom", Reporters Sans Frontières has said.
The Paris-based media watchdog demanded "an immediate explanation" for the move on Saturday, saying it was "extremely concerned about persistent episodes of censorship in Iraq".

Police ordered al-Jazeera's employees out of their newsroom and locked the door on Saturday night after the prime minister accused the pan-Arab satellite channel of inciting violence.

"They have been showing a lot of crimes and criminals on TV, and they [send] a bad picture about Iraq and about Iraqis and encourage criminals to increase their activities," Iraq's interior minister, Falah al-Naqib, said.

Al-Naqib said the closure was intended to give the station "a chance to readjust their policy against Iraq".

Prime minister Ayad Allawi cited the hoax videotape broadcast by the channel on Saturday that appeared to show an American being beheaded as an example of the coverage he opposed.

"I am worried about these people," he said. "I am not worried about whether al-Jazeera will like it or not."

A spokesman for the channel today said it showed just eleven seconds of the hoaxter's tape and went to great lengths afterwards to discuss how it had been duped by the American who had put the footage on the internet.

Mr Allawi brushed off criticism of the move, saying that the network's coverage of kidnappings encouraged terrorists and that the immediate concerns of security for Iraqis were much more important.


He said he had based his decision on the findings of a commission, set up by the government to monitor al-Jazeera's daily coverage

The prime minister, who spent years in exile in Britain, also said that he had asked an "independent panel" to "to see what kind of violence they [al-Jazeera] are advocating, inciting hatred and problems and racial tension."

An ominous violation of freedom

Al-Jazeera officials said the decision was an ominous violation of freedom of the press. Haider al-Mulla, a lawyer for al-Jazeera, said the channel would respect the closure decision but it would study legal options.

Mr al-Mullah said it had been asked to change its policy once the ban expired, but he indicated that this was unlikely to happen. "We said we have a firm principle and one policy that doesn't change," he said.

In an extraordinary scene broadcast live by the station, senior police officials arrived at its Baghdad offices on Saturday evening and sat around a table drinking soft drinks with senior staff members as they calmly explained that they had to carry out the order.

The officers refused to leave the office before locking the newsroom and telling employees to go home. Crossing his wrists as if handcuffed, a police officer warned Mr al-Mullah against violating the closure decision.

Mr al-Mullah said the closure decision was unclear and objected to its phrasing. Scribbling on a piece of paper, the police said they had to execute the order anyway, asking al-Mullah to take his complaints to the Interior Ministry.

Second time it has been banned

This is the second time the channel has been banned from operating in Iraq. In February, its Baghdad offices were closed for a month by the then transitional Iraqi governing council because it had reportedly shown disrespect toward prominent Iraqis.

The Saudi Arabian channel al-Arabya was also ordered out of Baghdad in November and not allowed to resume operations until it promised in writing not to encourage terrorism.

A spokesman for the channel, Jihad Ballout, said today that it would seek to challenge the ban if there was "any legal recourse available" but it would not be signing any statement that it didn't support terrorism.

"We don't need to give anything in writing because we don't support terrorism, that is a given. Gagging the media is not the way to deal with the media. If the request is that al Jazeera will compromise its independence, that is a request that will not be entertained," said Mr Billout.

"We will always cover a story and our independence is sacrosanct. We will not jeopardise or compromise that," he added.

The al-Jazeera English-language website today described the move as "regrettable" and said it "was contrary to pledges made by the Iraqi government to start a new era of free speech and openness".

Al-Jazeera has frequently been accused by US and Iraqi authorities of inciting violence by screening "exclusive" videotapes from Muslim extremists, including the al-Qaida leader, Osama bin Laden.

The US defence secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, has also accused both al-Jazeera and al-Arabya of harming the image of the United States in the Arab world.

During the war, the Americans were furious that al-Jazeera was able to broadcast from behind "enemy lines" without permission of coalition forces.

It was able to prove that Basra had not "fallen" as the coalition forces had claimed, because it had supplied locals with cameras and satellite phones before the war.

Through a network of what one of its senior journalists described as "collaborators" it was also able to show Americans in action after the war, often in a way the US forces did not like.

It showed that the Americans were continuing to bomb Fallujah after a truce had been declared.

In an Arab world rife with conspiracy theories, the decision to close the offices could reinforce the perception that decisions by Iraq's interim government are influenced by the Americans, who have long complained about the channel's coverage.

Government ministers in Iraq have grown increasingly critical of the television station in recent weeks.
[url=http://media.guardian.co.uk/broadcast/story/0,7493,1279407,00.htmlmediaguardian[/url]

...whatever an individual's opinions are on the matter- it's an interesting article- thank you Madeleine

Completely unjustified to be honest.

Our reporters for the bbc, channel 4, and a few others interview the 'terrorists' in Iraq, they show footage of them attacking americans, they allow them to explain why they're doing what they're doing, I don't hear any complaints about them.

Al-jazeera is doing nothing different, as with all good reporting it allows the viewers to make up their minds, I don't even recall any instances where it could have been proven to have a link to violence.

Completely ridiculous!

Why was al-Jazeera really closed?

A few years back, a major Arab government took "mild" action against al-Jazeera: the then information minister issued a decree preventing our correspondent from attending official functions.

When we contacted that government for an explanation, the minister cited a report we had aired, which had looked critically at a huge irrigation project that had flopped.

We pointed out to the minister that the report was not of our own production and that it had been aired by a major foreign news channel a couple of weeks beforehand.

We also noted that his government had not complained to the foreign channel. The minister replied that the other channel was broadcasting in English and many of his countrymen did not watch it.

But al-Jazeera "spoke" the same language and had a wide audience. As such the report was seen as an embarrassment.

Nothing was said about the report's accuracy or content, but the local media was instructed to launch an onslaught on al-Jazeera nonetheless - the main theme being that we were undermining the security of the state.

We have grown used to harassment from autocratic regimes in the Middle East, but since the Afghanistan war in 2001, we have had more harassment from US officials than from their Arab counterparts.

"Consistently lying" and "working in concert with terrorists" were some of the terms used by US secretary of defence Donald Rumsfeld to describe us.

Yet he came second best to his deputy, Paul Wolfowitz, who seemed to blame all the failures of his administration on al-Jazeera.

The closest they came to an explanation for these attacks was a compilation by the US-led Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq of what it called a "list of false and misleading reports". The list was never made public because it contained "sensitive information".

So from where is the government of US-appointed Iraqi prime minister Ayad Allawi going to get its inspiration when it comes to dealing with the media?

Taking the decision to close down the offices of al-Jazeera in Baghdad resonates well with the Arab official approach to the press, whereas the statements made by his officials to justify the decision resonate soundly with the US official approach that al-Jazeera has come to expect.

But there might be more to the latest Iraqi decision than is apparent.

Two weeks before the decision to close down al-Jazeera's offices, Ibrahim al-Janabi, the Allawi-appointed head of the commission that recommended these measures, cited the reporting of a sermon by the Shia cleric Moqtada al-Sadr in which he describedAllawi as an "American tail".

There is also possibly the more sinister motive of imposing a blockade on news reports while al-Sadr and the city of Najaf are "dealt with".

This might be a new venture for the interim government of Allawi, but it is not a new experience for al-Jazeera. Our offices have been closed in many an Arab capital before.

The wording of the justification of such action may differ from one country to another, but the gist is always the same: undermining state security (normally code for criticising the leadership); providing a platform for terrorists (usually means political opposition); and insulting the people of the country (normally means criticising a failed policy).

In the face of these policies, al-Jazeera has always had a simple approach: we are willing to stand corrected when shown that we were wrong, and to offer equal air time for the official version of events.

The rules that govern the way we report news have recently been put into a code of ethics and conduct, as we embark on a huge expansion of operations.

Plans are under way for a number of specialised channels to add to the existing news and sports channels.

These will include a documentaries and children's channel as well as an English-language news channel.

While we were disappointed by the Iraqi decision to close our Baghdad bureau, we have been comforted by the support we have received from media and free speech organisations all over the world.

The struggle for the truth is one with which the majority of media organisations empathise, and they appreciate that al-Jazeera's plight today could easily become theirs in the future.

The interim government of Iraq would do well to reconsider its unwise and unjustified decision. Should al-Jazeera's reporting go against its desires, then it ought to heed the advice of a US general who helped appoint it in the first place: "Just change the channel." One would have hoped that he was referring to the remote control rather than the physical removal of the channel and its premises.

Blaming the messenger for bad news might help in hiding these from the public for a while. But it doesn't make them go away.

· Maher Abdallah is head of international relations at the al-Jazeera TV channel
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What they said about ...

... Iraq's ban on al-Jazeera



The Iraqi prime minister's decision to close the Baghdad offices of al-Jazeera last weekend was widely condemned around the world. Ayad Allawi claimed that the Arab news channel's reports had been fomenting crime and violence in Iraq.
The Detroit Free Press judged the month-long ban "one of the most foolish actions taken by the interim Iraqi government", while the Palestine Chronicle considered it a "Saddam-like move".

The al-Jazeera website condemned the closure, saying it was "contrary to pledges made by the interim Iraqi government to start a new era of free speech and openness".

The network found support from the world's press for its coverage. "Al-Jazeera may be far from perfect," said the Australian, "but it looks more like part of the solution to theocracy and fundamentalism than part of the problem."

The New York Times agreed. "On the whole, it has been a healthy and crucially important force for change," said the paper in an editorial. "It often stands almost alone in holding the actions of previously unaccountable government up to public view." The danger now for Iraq, it added, was that the closure may give Mr Allawi's government "a freer hand to abuse human rights and pursue personal political vendettas in the name of restoring law and order".

The Johannesburg Star warned that by closing an "alternative, independent and credible voice, Mr Allawi is surely cementing perceptions that he is an American voice speaking Arabic".


The Lusaka Post pointed the finger of blame directly at the US. The Zambian daily noted that the closure of al-Jazeera's offices closely followed charges made by the US defence secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, that the news channel was harming the US image in the Arab world. The gagging was a "clear demonstration of the United States' hypocrisy on issues of liberties and human rights".

Al-Jazeera's absence over the coming month, predicted the Saudi Arab News, will "create a news vacuum which others will surely fill". The way to stop the media from showing "pictures of prisoners being humiliated or hostages being beheaded", it concluded, "is not to shoot the messenger; it is to stop the abuses".
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