[icernet] Western 'Freedom of the Press' in War Coverage Is Puzzling

[Arul Selvan]

  Since the outbreak of the Iraqi War, the world's major media have 
plunged themselves one after another into a news battle. However, if you 
read their news reports on the war carefully, you will find the puzzling 
practices of some Western countries and their media, which always flaunt 
"freedom of the press" and advertise themselves as being "true, 
objective and just" in their covering of the war.

Let's first say something about the "freedom of the press". According to 
a dispatch from Doha by a Chinese reporter, journalists who conduct 
interviews with the US Central Command in Qatar must abide by the "Three 
Don'ts" regulation. That is, don't ask about the casualties of the 
coalition forces; don't raise questions concerning current military 
actions; and don't ask questions relating to future military plans. In 
fact, what US troops forbid is exactly what the general public is 
concerned about and wants to know. Another news item from New York says 
that the Arab-language, Qatar headquartered Al-Jazeera TV paid the price 
for its reports which enraged the US government-two reporters stationed 
in the United States were expelled from the New York stock exchange, 
their news covering licenses were revoked. It can thus be seen that the 
"freedom of the press" consistently paraded by the West is attached with 
a string of conditions.

Then, let's come to the truthfulness of news. Truthfulness is the life 
of the press. But viewed from recent Western reports, some news items 
even give people the sense that "rumors are spreading everywhere". For 
example, shortly before the Iraq War started, British media suddenly 
reported that Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Tareq Aziz had "defected" to 
the northern Kurd area, but soon afterwards Aziz himself held a news 
briefing in Baghdad. That false report, therefore, collapsed of itself. 
On the very day of the outbreak of the war, Western media said Saddam 
and his two sons had been killed in the first round of bombings, but 
very soon they corrected the report by saying that the one who was 
killed was vice president Ramadan. But these reports proved to be false 
news when both Saddam and Ramadan appeared on TV. On March 21, AP said 
that the 8,000 soldiers of Iraqi Division 51 had "surrendered" to the 
coalition forces, but the Iraqi Ministry of Information rebutted the 
next day that the said Division was still fighting fiercely with the US 
troops and the division commander specially showed up on Al-Jazeera TV.

With regard to "objective, just and balanced" news reports, the 
practices of some Western media in covering the war are really not 
commendable. Numerous TV pictures are about the advance of the allied 
forces while very few pictures show crying Iraqi women and children. On 
the question of war prisoners, the West accused Iraqi TV Station of 
violating the provisions of the " Geneva Convention" concerning the 
treatment of war prisoners as the said station broadcast pictures 
showing war prisoners of US troops. But it forgot that it was the 
Western TV station that was the first to repeatedly broadcast clear 
pictures showing the coalition troops making a body search of Iraqi 
prisoners of war.

Agencia EFE S.A.'s report dispatched from Washington on March 27 said 
that US TVs made careful selections of content for reports on the Iraq 
War, as a result, the war situation seen in the United States is quite 
different from that viewed from other places of the world.

A report carried in the British Guardian on March 27, while touching 
upon the West's reports on the war, pointed out that democracy is being 
threatened in the United States, and those people against war on Iraq 
are never permitted to air their views. The newspaper said in another 
article that because the US, British and other Western TV stations are 
not just and fair in their reports, the number of European subscribers 
to Al-Jazeera doubled in the first few days after the start of the war.