New reports on press and other freedoms
I meant to mention this AFP report in my last post, but I'm tired so the brain is working a little groggily at this point.
It says this:
- Press freedom declined around the world last year, deteriorating for the first time in every region, according to a study released by Freedom House.
The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), meanwhile, unveiled its list of "10 worst countries to be a blogger," naming Myanmar, Iran, Syria, Cuba, Saudi Arabia, Vietnam, Tunisia, China, Turkmenistan and Egypt to its "dishonor roll."
Out of the 195 countries and territories covered in the Freedom House study, 70, or 36 percent, were rated "free," 61 (31 percent), were rated "partly free" and 64 (33 percent) were rated "not free."
Freedom House, which is funded by the US government and private groups and has been conducting an annual study of press freedom since 1980, said that 72 countries were rated free the previous year.
- It said Israel, Italy and Hong Kong slipped from free to partly free status in 2008.
Among the worst-rated states were Belarus, China, Cuba, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Iran, Laos, Libya, Myanmar, North Korea, the Palestinian territories, Rwanda and Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Zimbabwe.
This'll cheer you up.
Four hundred years of male domination ended Friday with the election of Carol Ann Duffy as Britain's Poet Laureate.
OT: VP Joe Biden has been added to the agenda of the AIPAC Conference, scheduled to speak Tue May 5 along with Sen John Kerry.
Helena,
The Freedom House report is particularly interesting on Israel and the OPTs
Freedom House report listed most worse countries for their behaviour with media.
Let stop here a moment and take US government what they done in Iraq for the last 6 eras in Iraq and how media treated there when news filtering to the degree that very controlled by US forces and official.
Helena let go back and remember Fallujah,
There is a worrying disparity in news reporting from main news media sources and news from within Iraq itself. Reports from Baghdad and Fallujah, by independent sources and journalists tell a very different story to the anesthetized and ideological versions of many of the main news distributors. Why are we not seeing the scores of refugees killed on the road from Fallujah, or the appalling conditions, or the other atrocities taking place in the town? Is there a conspiracy of silence on the part of the main Western media groups? To what extent is the media "aligned to the Bush Administration", as one US citizen and close observer of events in the region, contends.
Events taking place in Fallujah, as well as in other cities in Iraq, are of crucial importance for an understanding of the developing crisis in the country and the region. Many critics from within Iraq have openly accused the US forces of "genocide" in Fallujah; and many reports of civilian deaths and casualties indicate that this accusation may have some foundation.
"The American and European news stations don't show the dying Iraqis; they don't show the women and children bandaged and bleeding, the mother looking for some sign of her son in the middle of a puddle of blood and dismembered arms and legs. They don't show you the hospitals overflowing with the dead and dying because they don't want to hurt American feelings-but people should see it. You should see the price of your war and occupation-it's unfair that the Americans are fighting a war thousands of kilometers from home. They get their dead in neat, tidy caskets draped with a flag and we have to gather and scrape our dead off of the floor and hope the American shrapnel and bullets left enough to make a definite identification."
Cuba's got the best blogger in the world: Fidel Castro Ruz and his "Reflections of Fidel"
So much for the hopes of all those Palestinians who had hoped, back in the day, that Oslo would lead to the "liberation" of at least a part of Palestine.
Ohh, but Israel did "liberate" many, many Palestinians!!!
They "liberated" 22,000+ from the burden of owning some sort of home to live in!
They "liberated" tens of thousands more from the dreary task of going to work, since Israel "liberated" factories from existence!!
And Israel "liberated" over 1,400 from the burden of living!!!
Anyone else need "liberating?"
I am sure that Freedom House lists the US as "free", even though, as we know, no news that is unfavorable to Israel ever makes it into the MSM. Just as no mention of the single payer system of health care reform ever makes into the MSM. Maybe they consider the fact that Americans have access to other media, including very open blogs, sufficient to deserve a "free" rating. And how about the British press where a BBC reporter was just found guilty of unfair reporting for saying, among other things, that "everyone other than Israel considers the settlements in the OT illegal" since, even though the UN and all other countries consider them illegal, there are other individuals and organizations that don't. I do not know what penance was assigned to this reporter for this journalistic "outrage".
This is more about my ignorance, but is the irreverent AlJazeera seen in Qatar? If so, do they pull their punches when reporting on Qatar? Qatar has become such an important player lately that it is really helpful to learn a little more about it.