13 Feb 2013 | Index Index
YouTube filed lawsuit against the Russian government on 11 February, to contest its latest cybercrime law to censor websites deemed harmful to children. The case was filed after Russian regulators decided to block a joke YouTube video entitled ”Video lesson on how to cut your veins =D,” which showed viewers how to fake slitting their wrists. Rospotrebnadzor, the federal service for consumer rights, said the video glorified suicide and was therefore illegal under the law enacted in November, which has been criticised for being vague and overtly broad. YouTube owners Google proceeded to restrict access to the video in Russia before the lawsuit was filed. In the first legal challenge made against the law, YouTube objected to the ruling in a statement released on 12 February, saying that the law should not extend to limiting access on videos uploaded for entertainment purposes.
An Indian soldier stands alert in Srinagar, Kashmir during a curfew to curb protest over the hanging of Afzal Guru
A politician in Azerbaijan has offered a cash reward to any person who finds and cuts of the ear of an author who wrote a book about the conciliation of Azeris and Armenians, it was reported on 12 February. Akram Aylisli’s book Stone Dreams has stirred up controversy for referencing Azerbaijan’s violence against Armenians during riots preceding the collapse of the Soviet Union. The party of Hafiz Haciyev, the head of a pro-government political group in Azerbaijan have offered 10,000 manat (£8,000) for the ear of the writer, as part of a sustained hate campaign against Haciyev. He has been expelled from the Union of Writers, had his presidential pension revoked and his wife and son have lost their jobs. Protestors around the country have burned books and effigies of Haciyev. As Azerbaijan’s President, Ilham Aliyev approaches re-election later this year, the sustained negativity projected onto Haciyev is said to be a facade to hide the government’s internal issues amidst growing unrest.
Following protests in Kashmir over the execution of a man convicted of terrorism on 9 February, Kashmir’s internet and news outlets have been suppressed, and the entire Kashmir valley subjected to a strict curfew. Television channels and mobile internet were suspended immediately after Afzal Guru was hanged on 9 February. Local newspapers were forced to cease reporting the following day without warning — and have yet to be published since. Only the government, using state run service provider Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited, has access to the internet. Some residential districts of Srinagar reported to receive some TV news channels on 10 February, but privately-owned channels had to suspend news services at the request of the government. Afzal Guru’s execution in a New Delhi prison on 9 February prompted protests in three areas of India administered Kashmir, surrounding claims the men accused were given an unfair trial. Guru was sentenced to death for helping to plot a 2001 attack on the Indian parliament that left 14 people dead.
In Somalia, a journalist has been detained without charge for defending press freedom, after a woman who claimed she was raped and the journalist who interviewed her were imprisoned. Daud Abdi Daud remains in custody since 5 February, after he spoke out in a Mogadishu court against the one year jail sentence given to Abdiaziz Abdinuur and the alleged rape victim on 5 February. Daud Abdi said journalists should be able to interview who they wish, saying he would make attempts to interview the president’s wife, causing the police to arrest him. Daud Abdi was later transferred from police custody into Mogadishu Central Prison. On 6 February, the attorney general ordered his continued detention at the Police’s Central Investigation Department.
Carmarthenshire County Council’s decision to pursue a libel case using public funding has been criticised. The council’s chief executive Mark James appeared in London’s Royal Courts of Justice today (13 February) where he and blogger Jacqui Thompson are suing each other for defamation following a series of comments posted online. James’s costs were indemnified by the council after a controversial decision in 2008, allowing public money to be used to fund libel lawsuits. Carmarthenshire County Council is believed to be the only authority to allow this in the UK, and the Welsh Assembly has questioned its legality, after an order they made in 2006 forbade local authorities from offering indemnities in libel cases. Carmarthenshire County Council said they had relied upon section 111 of the Local Government Act 1972, rather than the 2006 law. The case likely to cost a six or seven figure sum, according to reports.
13 Feb 2013 | Middle East and North Africa
OPINION: In June 2010, Israel’s Ynet website reported on the detention, and then six months later on the death, of unknown detainee “Prisoner X” in solitary confinement.
A gag order issued by an Israeli court soon after put an end to any reporting on the case, or even reporting of the order itself. “Prisoner X” became a byword in the Israeli media for yet one more of the kind of security-related stories that no-one quite knows the truth of, and probably never will.
Nothing more was heard until this week, when an Australian TV documentary claimed that the man in question was one Ben Zygier, a 34-year-old father-of-two and an Australian citizen who had moved to Israel a decade earlier.
Zygier, who called himself Ben Alon in Israel, was apparently held in the cell — built to hold Yigal Amir, the assassin of Israeli prime minister Yitzhak Rabin — for a number of months before he was found hanged, and his body flown to Melbourne a week later. His father Geoffrey, a grandee of the Jewish community there, has refused to speak to the media regarding his son.
Military censorship and wide-reaching gag orders are a fact of life for Israeli journalists. But this gag order was absolute. Articles which appeared on a number of Israeli websites yesterday noting the Australian programme were soon removed.
Even more extraordinary was the meeting called that afternoon by the Prime Minister’s office convening the so-called “Editors’ Committee”, a grouping set up in the early years of the state through which senior media figures could be briefed on secret information if they agreed to not publish it.
Historically this was a sort of gentleman’s agreement between the hacks and the establishment, who in the nascent days of Israel were understood to be more or less on the same side. Now, the annual meeting between the PM and the Editors’ Committee has become largely a matter of show, open to the scrutiny of other journalists. Self-censorship is managed more obliquely.
The Prisoner X situation was so extraordinary that a number of MKs used parliamentary privilege yesterday to ask the outgoing Justice Minister, Yaakov Ne’eman about the Australian reports. Zahava Gal-On, head of the left-wing Meretz faction pouring scorn on the implied complicity of the Israeli media.
“I want to hear your stance on the fact that journalists volunteer to censor information at the government’s request,” she said. “Is it proper that the Prime Minister’s Office invited the Editors’ Committee to prevent news from being publicised? Today, we hear that in a country that claims to be a civilized democracy, journalists cooperate with the government, and that anonymous prisoners, who no one knew existed, commit suicide.”
The gag order has now been softened, perhaps due to the MKs’ questions, and Israeli media are now reporting on the Australian story. But it’s the press rather than politicians who should be charged with exposing this kind of event.
There is an argument to be made that there is a need for some level of censorship to protect national security. But the censors need to choose their battles.
It’s stupid and self-destructive to try and suppress a story after it appears on a foreign media outlet. The suppression will inevitably serves to draw additional attention to the story.
The danger is that security becomes its own justification for censorship with a creeping reach.
Daniella Peled is editor at the Institute of War and Peace Reporting and writes widely on the Middle East
13 Feb 2013 | Middle East and North Africa
OPINION: In June 2010, Israel’s Ynet website reported on the detention, and then six months later on the death, of unknown detainee “Prisoner X” in solitary confinement.
A gag order issued by an Israeli court soon after put an end to any reporting on the case, or even reporting of the order itself. “Prisoner X” became a byword in the Israeli media for yet one more of the kind of security-related stories that no-one quite knows the truth of, and probably never will.
Nothing more was heard until this week, when an Australian TV documentary claimed that the man in question was one Ben Zygier, a 34-year-old father-of-two and an Australian citizen who had moved to Israel a decade earlier.
Zygier, who called himself Ben Alon in Israel, was apparently held in the cell — built to hold Yigal Amir, the assassin of Israeli prime minister Yitzhak Rabin — for a number of months before he was found hanged, and his body flown to Melbourne a week later. His father Geoffrey, a grandee of the Jewish community there, has refused to speak to the media regarding his son.
Military censorship and wide-reaching gag orders are a fact of life for Israeli journalists. But this gag order was absolute. Articles which appeared on a number of Israeli websites yesterday noting the Australian programme were soon removed.
Even more extraordinary was the meeting called that afternoon by the Prime Minister’s office convening the so-called “Editors’ Committee”, a grouping set up in the early years of the state through which senior media figures could be briefed on secret information if they agreed to not publish it.
Historically this was a sort of gentleman’s agreement between the hacks and the establishment, who in the nascent days of Israel were understood to be more or less on the same side. Now, the annual meeting between the PM and the Editors’ Committee has become largely a matter of show, open to the scrutiny of other journalists. Self-censorship is managed more obliquely.
The Prisoner X situation was so extraordinary that a number of MKs used parliamentary privilege yesterday to ask the outgoing Justice Minister, Yaakov Ne’eman about the Australian reports. Zahava Gal-On, head of the left-wing Meretz faction pouring scorn on the implied complicity of the Israeli media.
“I want to hear your stance on the fact that journalists volunteer to censor information at the government’s request,” she said. “Is it proper that the Prime Minister’s Office invited the Editors’ Committee to prevent news from being publicised? Today, we hear that in a country that claims to be a civilized democracy, journalists cooperate with the government, and that anonymous prisoners, who no one knew existed, commit suicide.”
The gag order has now been softened, perhaps due to the MKs’ questions, and Israeli media are now reporting on the Australian story. But it’s the press rather than politicians who should be charged with exposing this kind of event.
There is an argument to be made that there is a need for some level of censorship to protect national security. But the censors need to choose their battles.
It’s stupid and self-destructive to try and suppress a story after it appears on a foreign media outlet. The suppression will inevitably serves to draw additional attention to the story.
The danger is that security becomes its own justification for censorship with a creeping reach.
Daniella Peled is editor at the Institute of War and Peace Reporting and writes widely on the Middle East
11 Feb 2013 | Index Index
A boy has died today (11 February) after being shot by security forces in Kashmir during protests against the execution of a separatist. Ubaid Mushtaq, said to be 12 or 13 years old by doctors, died in a Srinagar hospital from bullet wounds following the 10 February protests in the village of Watergam, in which paramilitary forces opened fire on demonstrators.
The news of Mohammed Afzal Guru’s death in a New Delhi prison on 9 February ignited fierce objection and protests in three areas of India administered Kashmir, surrounding claims the men accused had not been given a fair trial. The Kashmiri man was from a village close to Watergam, and had been convicted of helping to plot an attack on the Indian parliament in 2001 that left 14 people dead. Police said an inquiry has been launched into Mushtaq’s shooting.
Chinese authorities said Elton John dedicating his Beijing concert to Ai Weiwei was “disrespectful”
China has tightened its restrictions on foreign singers performing in the country after Elton John dedicated his Beijing concert to Ai Weiwei in November. Chinese police questioned John after his Beijing performance last year, which he had dedicated “to the spirit and talent of Ai Weiwei”. Authorities then allegedly asked John to sign a statement saying that he had been inspired by Ai’s artistic achievements exclusively, rather than for his efforts to defend free speech. John was permitted to go ahead with his Guangzhou show in early December, but an editorial letter in the state-run Global Times said that the singer was “disrespectful” to include political sentiment in his performance, adding that authorities would think more carefully before inviting foreign artists to perform in future. Culture minister Cai Wu is now allegedly requesting degree certificates from international performers since John’s appearance, only allowing them entry into the country if they can prove they have been university-educated. Classical musicians have reportedly been required to submit proof of degrees when performing in the country since the start of the year.
A Hong Kong activist has been sentenced to nine months in prison on 7 February after burning a Chinese flag. Koo Sze-yiu was also discovered to have burned a Hong Kong flag, during two separate demonstrations against the government. In June 2012, Koo burned a Chinese flag outside the Liaison Office of the Central People’s Government, in protest against the staged suicide of Chinese activist Li Wangyang, and on 1 January he was seen waving a Chinese and Hong kong flag with holes in both. He was charged with four counts of flag desecration. The maximum punishment for flag desecration is three years in prison and a fine of 50,000 HK dollars (approximately £4,000). Shortly after his arrest, a Chinese netizen was arrested for posting a picture of a defaced flag on to a social networking site.
A UK journalist is fighting a court application submitted by the police requiring him to hand over video footage of the English Defence League (EDL), it was reported today (11 February). Jason Parkinson has refused to hand over his footage, saying that journalists are “not evidence gatherers for the police”. He fought a similar case in 2011, where police attempted to seize his footage of the Dale Farm eviction of travellers in Essex. Greater Manchester police applied for a production order hearing on 18 February to view all published and unpublished footage obtained during an EDL and counter protest march by Unite Against Fascism in Bolton 20 March 2010. The National Union of Journalists intends to contest the application. Parkinson said that handing over the evidence “could overturn the incredibly important victory for press freedom” that was achieved during the Dale Farm eviction.
In Bangalore, India an artist was forced to remove his pantings from an art gallery on 5 February because they depicted Hindu deities in the nude. Anirudh Sainath Krishnamani was told by police that they received a complaint from a member of Hindu nationalist political group the Bharatiya Janata Party, claiming the paintings ”hurt the sentiments of society”. Police threatened to shut down Krishnamani’s exhibition at Chitrakala Parishath gallery if he refused to remove the offending pieces, which police said were a potential law and order threat and could cause protests or an attack. The paintings removed included a picture of a nude goddess Kali as well as Shiva and Sati hugging each other. MN Krishnamani, Anirudh’s father and a senior supreme court advocate will contest the decision.
