31 Jul 2012 | Tunisia
Atheist Ghazi Beji, who was sentenced to seven-and-a-half years in prison in absentia last March for insulting Islam has written an apology to Muslims. Beji, who fled the country before being sentenced for publishing a satirical book entitled “The illusion of Islam, published the apology on his Facebook page and in an interview with Nawaat.org this week:
I belong to a very conservative family. At 12, I used to recite Quran. I took part in a Quran recitation competition at the Grand Mosque of Mahdia, and I won the first prize. When I mixed with Muslims, I discovered catastrophes and I was very disappointed. I saw them boasting about an external appearance of Islam, either clothes or utterances…But, in action they were faithless to God’s book…I was thinking about it and I wanted Muslims to wake up from their slumber. They would talk about truth but would never utter it if it harms their own interests, they would pray but would not care about garbage next to the mosque, and they would preach about justice but would not put it into practice. My idea was to provoke Muslims.
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18 Jul 2012 | Events
Date: Thursday 19 July
Time: 7-8.30pm
Venue: Frontline club, 13 Norfolk Place, London W2 1QJ
Tickets: Book here
It has been a year since the Prime Minister announced an inquiry examining the culture, practices and ethics of the media in light of the phone-hacking scandal. Since then we have heard from journalists, editors, proprietors, politicians and victims of phone-hacking. As hearings come to a close and Lord Justice Leveson begins to compile his report, join Frontline and Index on Censorship for a panel discussion, followed by Q&A on what the Inquiry has learned and what it should achieve.
Will new regulation damage the free press? How should public interest be defined? Can we ensure protection for sources and whistleblowers? How should relationships between journalists, proprietors, politicians and police be conducted in the future?
Panel includes:
David Aaronovitch, writer, broadcaster, commentator and regular columnist for The Times. He is author of Voodoo Histories: The role of Conspiracy Theory in Modern History and Paddling to Jerusalem: An Aquatic Tour of Our Small Country. Twitter: @DAaronovitch
Brian Cathcart, professor of journalism at Kingston University London and founder of the Hacked Off campaign. He served as specialist adviser to the commons media select committee in 2008-10. He was a journalist at Reuters, the Independent and the New Statesman, and has written books about the murders of Stephen Lawrence and Jill Dando, as well as on the history of nuclear science. Twitter: @BrianCathcart
Helen Lewis, deputy editor at the New Statesman. As well as commissioning and editing, she writes for the NS magazine and blogs for its website, with favoured topics including comedy, feminism, politics and computer games. She has also written forEdge magazine, the Stylist, Square Meal and the Guardian; she reviews the papers on Sky News and has appeared on the Today programme, Woman’s Hour and The Daily Politics. Twitter:@helenlewis
Angela Phillips, senior lecturer in journalism at Goldsmiths College, author of Good Writing for Journalists and co-author of Changing Journalism. She has been a journalist for over 30 years, starting in the alternative press of the 1970s and moving on to work for national newspapers, magazines, television and radio (the BBC and independents). She is also the chair of the Ethics Committee of the Coordinating Committee for Media Reform and gave evidence to the Leveson inquiry on Friday 13 July, 2012. Twitter: @AngelaELL
You can read our policy note on the key challenges for the Leveson Inquiry below:
Freedom of the Press, Governance and Press Standards: Key Challenges for the Leveson Inquiry
17 Jul 2012 | Asia and Pacific, Index Index, minipost
A shooting attack in the Indian city of Itanagar left Tongam Rina, associate editor of the Arunachal Times newspaper, critically injured on Sunday. It has been reported that, as Rina arrived at the paper’s offices at 6:15pm, unidentified gunmen opened fire on her before fleeing the scene. She was rushed to hospital, where she remains in intensive care and is said to have sustained serious injuries to the spinal cord and intestines. The motive of the attack is unknown, though Rina has reportedly received threats in the past in connection with her campaigning against dam construction on the Siang River.
16 Jul 2012 | Russia
The pro-Putin United Russia party has re-criminalised defamation, just half a year since it was decriminalised on the initiative of ex-president Dmitry Medvedev.
The move is in line with Russian government’s authoritarian response to a number of mass protests. Since Vladimir Putin returned to the Kremlin, the State Duma has passed scandalous laws against rally organisers, NGOs which receive financial support from abroad and a blacklist of websites, which lets authorities shut down websites without the court’s decision. (more…)
