Interesting Times

Google News to Rupert Murdoch: Bring It on

2009-11-10T18:26:29-05:00

The jousting between media tycoon Rupert Murdoch and the world's most popular website is heating up, with Google News telling the head of the News Corp. a resounding "as you wish."

(EPA photo)

In recent days Murdoch (above), the head of the parent company of the Wall Street Journal, Fox News and many others, and his top executives have complained that the use of News Corp. content by search indexes, such as Google News, Microsoft and Ask.com, is tantamount to "kleptomania" and accused them of being "parasites."

Murdoch is threatening to charge for the content of its media empire on the Internet and to remove such content from any Internet search index.

Google News countered by saying any news organization is free to have its content removed from the search index by just requesting it.

The Google News response as quoted by Agence France Press:

"News organisations are in complete control over whether and how much of their content appears in search results," it said said in a statement issued in London.

"Publishers put their content on the web because they want it to be found, so very few choose not to include their material in Google News and web search. But if they tell us not to include it, we don't."

It added: "If publishers want their content to be removed from Google News specifically all they need to do it tell us."

Google said its news listings service and web searches were a "tremendous source of promotion" for news organisations, sending them "about 100,000 clicks every minute".

Murdoch is also after the fair use doctrine, which argues that the Internet would be deprived of its very reason to exists if aggregators (such as us) would be kept from linking to other pages or sites.

"There's a doctrine called fair use, which we believe to be challenged in the courts and would bar it altogether... but we'll take that slowly," threatened Murdoch.

All the huffing and puffing by the Murdoch empire seems to have popped up after its heavy investments into Internet social networks, such as MySpace, have failed to respond to expectations.

Also, building firewalls to keep the Internet's traffic controllers from driving users to your content sounds like a lose-lose proposition, no matter how powerful News Corp. may be.

The New York Times, and many copycats after it, tried this approach once before and after a resounding failure, it went back to open access again.

We believe the Internet is not the newspaper slayer it has been portrayed to be, especially in the US, whose newspaper industry is undergoing the worst crisis in its history.

In fact, we believe the Internet is a transformational force of unprecedented proportions. The challenge is to learn how live and prosper with it.

In other words, war is not the answer.

Iran Releases 4 Journalists Arrested During Street Clashes

2009-11-09T18:06:08-05:00

The Iranian regime keeps toying with press freedom like a kitten playing with a ball of yarn.

Iranian riot police charge on pro-democracy
demonstrators in Tehran on Nov. 4 (EPA photo)

The Tehran bosses decided to free three foreign and one Iranian journalists who were arrested during last week's counter-demonstrations that took place in the capital during celebrations of the 30th anniversary of the storming of the US Embassy.

The Washington Post, quoting Iranian official media, reported that two unnamed German and one Canadian reporters were released from prison, where they had been charged with "unauthorized reporting" of the opposition demonstrations that took place on Wednesday during the anniversary observation.

Also, Farhad Poulad, an Iranian working for Agence France Press, was released from prison.

All of them were arrested at the opposition's counter-demonstrations, which marked the strongest show of force by pro-democracy forces in two months and were marred by violent clashes between demonstrators and riot police on the streets of Tehran.

More than 100 people were arrested during the incidents, with more than 60 remaining under custody after the rest were released following questioning.

If green is the color of hope, pro-democracy forces in Iran have shown enough of it. But they are confronting a formidable enemy, which is very deeply entrenched in both authoritarian ways and a conviction of their "being on the side of God."

And that is a very explosive formula.

China Will Stop Physically Punishing People for Internet Addiction

2009-11-06T19:32:10-05:00

That headline seems to come straight out of a sci-fi movie.

What can you say when a control-obsessed regime measures the level of Internet interaction of any given citizen? And what if the number of citizens reaches 1.3 billion?

The whole thing makes you wonder whether you still are in Kansas or not.

It turns out China's solution to the so-called Internet addiction is boot camps, as in places where youngsters bitten by the digital bug are interned into places "imbued with a military atmosphere," reports The Times of India.

Chinese parents have turned to more than 200 organisations offering treatment for internet "disorders" as the government increasingly warns of unhealthy internet habits among the young.

Many of the camps are imbued with a military atmosphere. Patients are forced to replace hours in front of the computer with arduous physical drills or even more extreme "treatments".

"When intervening to prevent improper use of the internet, we should ... strictly prohibit restriction of personal freedom and physical punishments," the ministry said in a draft guideline for internet use by minors, posted on its website.

The whole affair comes out amid the dreadful background of a tragic case. A 15-year-old by the name of Deng Senshan was pronounced dead days after he checked into an Internet addiction boot camp in the southwestern region of Guangxi.

Another kid survived his encounter with "healers" after he was treated for water in his lungs and kidney failure.

But wait. There is more. Up until July, the government of China finally banned the use of electro-shock therapy to treat this addiction.

We would not be surprised if this entirely sad story was turned into a horror movie. In the meantime, this is actually taking place in China.

The Slaughter of Mexican Journalists Haunt Us All

2009-11-03T18:43:02-05:00

Another brave Mexican journalist has fallen victim of the rampant violence that is relentlessly punishing that country.

The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) reports that El Tiempo de Durango's reporter Bladimir Antuna García was abducted and murdered on Monday in the city of Durango.

This new crime against press freedom and human decency raises to 41 the total of Mexican journalists who have been murdered in that country since 1994, according to CPJ.

We don't know what is larger, our admiration for the Mexican journalistic profession or the outrage that provokes the impunity with which these crimes are dealt in that country.

In the following release, CPJ is also urging the Mexican government to show commitment in fighting this terrible plague:

New York, November 3, 2009—Crime reporter Bladimir Antuna García was found murdered Monday night, according local news reports, after reportedly being abducted from a street in the Mexican city of Durango that morning. The Committee to Protect Journalists called on Mexican authorities to show their commitment to press freedom and the protection of Mexican journalists by immediately bringing all those responsible to justice.

Antuna, 39, a reporter for the daily El Tiempo de Durango, was on his way to work Monday morning when, according to witnesses cited by the local press, his car was boxed in by two other vehicles in Durango, 558 miles (899 kilometers) northeast of Mexico City. Armed men got out of a Jeep Cherokee, and dragged Antuna from his car into theirs before speeding away. The reporter was immediately reported missing.

Local authorities found the reporter’s body that evening not far from where he was abducted. Next to the body was a note stating: “This happened to me for giving information to soldiers and for writing too much,” according to national daily La Jornada. Local investigators told reporters that Antuna appeared to have been strangled, and there were no noticeable signs of bullet wounds.

“Bladimir Antuna García’s killing is yet another brutal reminder of the very precarious and dangerous situation in which Mexican reporters, especially those covering crime and corruption, work,” said Carlos Lauría, CPJ’s senior program coordinator for the Americas. “Mexican authorities must immediately investigate Antuna’s death, and bring all the perpetrators to justice in an effort to prove their commitment to press freedom and journalist safety.”

Victor Garza, editor of El Tiempo de Durango, told CPJ that in the week before his death Antuna had broken a story on corruption in the Durango City Police. Antuna had also investigated the murder of fellow El Tiempo de Durango reporter Carlos Ortega Samper, who was kidnapped on April 3 in a similar manner and then shot to death, though Antuna had not yet published a story, colleagues in Durango said. Ortega reported on local corruption. His murder remains unsolved, and CPJ continues to investigate whether Ortega’s death was linked to his work as a journalist.

Antuna’s colleagues said he had received at least three death threats in recent months. The most recent, they told CPJ, was a telephone threat from an unidentified individual who told the reporter that he would get no further warnings. Antuna did not say why he was being threatened. In April, armed men approached the reporter’s home at night but did not open fire, a colleague said. Antuna filed a complaint with local authorities for unspecified problems, the Spanish newswire EFE reported.

The local press freedom group Center for Journalism and Public Ethics said today that Antuna had told the organization last June that he had been in contact with another Durango journalist who was murdered in May, Eliseo Barrón Hernández. The center said Antuna told them he and Barrón had been exchanging information about police corruption and organized crime in the state.

In late October, the newly elected Mexican Chamber of Deputies decided not to renew the mandate of a special congressional committee on violence against the press, which had been appointed in 2006. CPJ called on Mexico’s Congress to show its full commitment to a free press by granting federal authorities jurisdiction over crimes against freedom of expression, a reform still pending in the legislature.

According to CPJ’s research, 39 journalists, including Antuna, have been killed since 1992. At least 17 were slain in direct reprisal for their work. Seven journalists have disappeared since 2005. Most covered organized crime or government corruption.

On May 25, Barrón Hernández, crime reporter for the dailies La Opinion and Milenio, was abducted from his home and shot to death. Federal prosecutors charged five men in June with Barrón’s murder. The head of the drug cartel Los Zetas allegedly ordered the reporter’s killing “in order to teach a lesson to other local journalists so that they wouldn’t meddle in the work of the delinquent group,” the Mexican federal prosecutor’s office said, according to local news reports. Four other reporters have been killed this year in Mexico. CPJ continues to investigate whether their deaths were linked to their work.

CPJ is a New York-based, independent, nonprofit organization that works to safeguard press freedom around the world.

Exporting Censorship Chinese Style, One Festival at a Time

2009-11-02T18:44:55-05:00

Try to find one single manufactured item in your household that is not made in China. Hard, isn't it?

Well, there is one more export that China is trying to flood the international market with: censorship.

The BBC reports about how the telescopic tentacles of China's censorship apparatus are reaching out to unheard-of limits, including international film, book and cultural festivals where, otherwise, contributors' creativity would not be imprisoned by Medieval repression techniques.

The BBC adds Chinese "diplomatic" officials are trying to silence international cultural fora where uncomfortable works by Chinese dissidents or banned artists are featured.

Exhibit A: Richard Moore, the head of the Melbourne International Film Festival, received a call from the local Chinese consulate urging him to remove the work of Uighur Chinese activist Rebiya Kadeer.

"It came down to [the consular official] saying we need to justify our decision to include the film in the programme. It was a remarkable display of confidence and arrogance," he said.

The festival decided to ignore the advice and go ahead with the film - about an activist who campaigns for better rights for China's Uighur minority - but that did not end the issue.

The festival organisation was subjected to an intense campaign of threats, intimidation and disruption, although it is not clear who - if anyone - orchestrated the campaign.

The festival e-mail address received insulting messages, there were waves of annoying phone calls and the fax machine was jammed with callers.

Some notes to the organisers contained messages threatening Mr Moore's family.

Exhibit B: International Chinese censors used similar tactics to impose their will at the Frankfurt Book Fair, an event trying to portray itself as a "worldwide marketplace for ideas".

That title unsurprisingly attracted Chinese censors like a magnet. Since China was "the guest of honor" of the event (note to organizers: read Interesting Times), they were bombarded with demands that two Chinese dissident writers were removed from the speaker schedule.

The dissidents were eventually allowed to address the event, but Chinese officials were fuming at the decision.

A lesson: We all should be very aware of the fact that China treats freedom of expression and press freedom as commodities that can be dealt with in international markets.

It is incumbent upon all of us, therefore, that when Chinese officials are invited to international cultural festivals to assume that they will show up disguised as sheep.

Tunisian Journalist Imprisoned on Trumped-up Charges

2009-10-30T17:40:53-04:00

Our friends at IFEX's Tunisia Monitor Group inform us that a court in Tunisia has charged dissident journalist Taoufik Ben Brik with outrageous crimes and put him in prison.

The group reports that the trumped-up charges include "damaging other people's property," "violation of public morality standards," defamation and "extreme aggression." The charges carry a maximum sentence of five years in prison.

Ben Brik, one of the most vocal critics of the regime of President Ben Ali, will remain in custody until the day of his trial, Nov. 19.

A member of the group was able to talk to both Ben Brik's wife and attorney and both told him "this is part of a vengeful campaign to humiliate and punish Ben Ali's critics, in the wake of Sunday's mock elections."

(EPA photo)

The group added that on Saturday, "Ben Ali (above) threatened to take to court what he called a 'tiny minority' of Tunisians cooperating with foreign journalists to cast doubt on the results of the elections and tarnish the image of the country."

The group also reported that another dissident journalist, Lofti Hidouri, "remains under tight police surveillance and received phone threats from the two plain clothes police standing near his home in Al Mourouj, in the Southern suburbs of Tunis."

The imprisonment has unleashed a storm of international criticism, including groups such as Amnesty International, the World Association of Newspapers and Reporters without Borders.

And now the World Press Freedom Committee.

ICANN Opens the Gates to These: 字한漢بر ض

2009-10-30T17:05:27-04:00

In a historic decision, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) has approved the use of non-Latin characters from start to finish.

ICANN will launch its new International Domain Fast Track Process on Nov. 16, allowing countries and territories from throughout the world to use their own characters to Internet extensions.

"The coming introduction of non-Latin characters represents the biggest technical change to the Internet since it was created four decades ago," said ICANN chairman Peter Dengate Thrush. "Right now Internet address endings are limited to Latin characters – A to Z. But the Fast Track Process is the first step in bringing the 100,000 characters of the languages of the world online for domain names."

The decision follows years of discussions, technical testing and international cooperation.

"This is only the first step, but it is an incredibly big one and an historic move toward the internationalization of the Internet ," said Rod Beckstrom, ICANN's President and CEO. "The first countries that participate will not only be providing valuable information of the operation of IDNs in the domain name system, they are also going to help to bring the first of billions more people online – people who never use Roman characters in their daily lives."

More information about this historic development here.

WPFC Urges Argentine Senate to Pass Crucial Bill

2009-10-30T12:00:53-04:00

The World Press Freedom Committee yesterday sent a letter to the President of the Argentine Senate urging him to promptly pass a bill that would decriminalize defamation offenses pertaining to matters of public interest.

The bill does not move these offenses from the Criminal Code to the Civil Code, but at least it keeps criminal defamation out of the way of journalists seeking the truth and keeping public officials accountable before the rest of society.

The letter also congratulates the House of Deputies for having passed the bill the day before.

WPFC has been involved in this reform since 2001, when we first started supporting, both morally and financially, journalist Eduardo Kímel, whose case reached all the way to the Inter-American Court of Human Rights. The tribunal ruled for Kímel in May of 2008 and ordered the Argentine State to reform its defamation laws.

This is the full letter sent to Senate President Julio César Cleto Cobos:

Oct. 29, 2009

His Excellency Julio César Cleto Cobos
President
Senate Chamber
Congreso de la Nación
Buenos Aires, Argentina

Your Excellency:
The World Press Freedom Committee —an organization representing 44 press freedom groups from throughout the world— celebrates the approval by the Honorable Chamber of Deputies of Bill No. 1243 reforming the Criminal Code to decriminalize defamation laws and urges the Senate to follow suit as soon as possible.

The bill reforms articles 109, 110, 111, 113 and 117, and eliminates Art. 112 so that defamation offenses are excluded in case of “expressions referred to matters of public interest.”

The presidential bill is your country’s response to the instructions by the Inter-American Court of Human Rights included in its May 2, 2008 decision about the Kímel vs Argentina case, in which it orders the Argentine State to reform its criminal defamation laws, indicating that, “The Criminal Code is the most restrictive means to establish responsibilities in any illicit behavior (…) The ample interpretation of libel and calumny may attempt against the principle of minimum intervention and the ultima ratio concept in criminal law.”

The court sentence also stated that, “Opinions shall not be subject to sanctions, especially when the matter at hand is an opinion about the performance of a public official.”

This decision constitutes a historical landmark in the Western Hemisphere’s press freedom jurisprudence and the vindication for the victim of this case, journalist Eduardo Kímel.

It all started in 1991 when he published his book “The San Patricio Massacre,” a detailed account of the murders of three priests and two seminary students in Belgrano, Argentina, in 1976, during the military dictatorship. The perpetrators of the crimes are still at large, and Mr. Kímel's investigation concluded that the judge assigned to the case, Guillermo Rivarola, was negligent in his ruling because it was obvious that the order to murder those five came from the core of the military junta.

Judge Rivarola later pressed defamation charges against Mr. Kímel, who was sentenced to one year in prison and to pay a $20,000 fine. After a long legal battle in Argentina, the case ended up before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights in 2001. Upon the recommendation of the Commission and the Organization of American States’ Special Rapporteur for Freedom of Expression, the Court accepted the case in 2007.

We must underline, however, our misgivings about some of the parts of the version passed by the Chamber of Deputies. The reformed Art. 111 preserves the antiquated legal concept that imposes the burden of the proof on the defendant. Also, the exclusion of “expressions referred to matters of public interest” leaves the door open to potential plaintiffs willing to challenge the public scope of any matter.

In any instance, the Bill breaks with the status quo that has kept expressions about public matters in the Criminal Code as a Damocles sword dangling over the heads of Argentine journalists, who still risk their assets and even their freedom just by fulfilling their obligation to keep the public informed.

Again, we reiterate our call to approve this historic reform so that Argentina gives a resounding democratic example and joins the other three Latin American nations that have decriminalized their defamation laws: El Salvador, Mexico and, more recently, Uruguay.

Respectfully,
Richard N. Winfield                                             Javier Sierra
Chairman,                                                          Projects Director,
World Press Freedom Committee                  World Press Freedom Committee

CC: The President of the Honorable Chamber of Deputies
The members of the Senate
Members of the Argentine media
Representatives of the inter-American justice system
The members of the Coordinating Committee of Press Freedom Organizations:
•    Committee to Protect Journalists
•    Inter American Press Association
•    International Association of Broadcasting
•    International Federation of the Periodical Press
•    International Press Institute
•    North American Broadcasters Association
•    World Association of Newspapers
•    World Press Freedom Committee

US Comes out Strong against Defamation of Religion Movement

2009-10-27T09:52:00-04:00

Secretary Clinton at the presser where she released the
Freedom of Religion Report (EPA Photo)

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton gave a decisive push to press freedom around the world by openly denouncing the defamation of religion movement.

The movement, fundamentally supported by the Organization of the Islamic Conference, has gained strong momentum in recent times at international bodies, especially at the UN General Assembly, its Human Rights Council and its Conference against Racism.

Clinton, during the release of the State Department's annual Report on International Freedom of Religion, was quoted by the Associated Press as saying, "Some claim that the best way to protect the freedom of religion is to implement so-called anti-defamation policies that would restrict freedom of expression and the freedom of religion. I strongly disagree."

The international opposition to this very dangerous movement was able to garner some momentum (here and here), but the Obama administration's decisive pronouncement against it changes the dynamics of the game in a fundamental way.

The AP via The Washington Post:

"The protection of speech about religion is particularly important since persons of different faith will inevitably hold divergent views on religious questions," Clinton said. "These differences should be met with tolerance, not with the suppression of discourse."

(...)

The effort is widely seen as a reaction to perceived anti-Islamic incidents, including the publication in Europe of several cartoons depicting the Prophet Mohammed.

Michael Posner, the assistant U.S. secretary of state for human rights, democracy and labor whose office prepares the religious freedom report, said the resolution "goes too far."

"The notion that a religion can be defamed and that any comments that are negative about that religion can constitute a violation of human rights to us violates the core principle of free speech," he said.

Posner went out to clearly state that a resolution about the defamation of religion "is a violation of free speech."

For many months we have been expressing our stern opposition to a resolution that would allow states to repress, and not protect, freedom of religion not only in their countries but anywhere in the world.

We believe this movement would establish the globalization of blasphemy laws, the Biblical and Koranic precursors of today's infamous insult laws.

In fact, an international resolution on defamation of religions would give the clergy not only the power to criminalize any expressions or activities that they deem insulting to their faith but also to deny any individual the right not to believe in any religion or to convert to any another faith.

We congratulate the Obama administration on this show of courage, which so far is the most decisive to oppose a very toxic international movement.

US Papers Circulation Continues Nosediving; but Revenue Report Upbeat

2009-10-26T18:48:51-04:00

The circulation recession among US newspapers continues unabated during the six months ending in September 2009, with some major publications taking devastating double-digit red numbers, especially The San Francisco Chronicle and the Miami Herald.

On the other hand, circulation revenues —boosted up by some drastic marketing decisions— provide an optimistic hue to yet another depressing report.

Trade publication Editor & Publisher reports that according to the Audit Bureau of Circulation, the average US newspaper took one of the worst hits in recorded history, with a 10.6-percent industry-wide decline.

The news proved to be particularly devastating for The San Francisco Chronicle, which lost more than a quarter (25.8 percent) of its daily circulation, and more than 22 percent of its Sunday circulation.

Another big loser was the Miami Herald, with a daily decline of 23 percent and a Sunday drop of 14.6 percent.

(EPA photo)

USA Today ceased to be the country's top circulation paper, taking an overall hit of 17 percent. Now the best national seller is the Wall Street Journal (above), which, remarkably, experienced a .6 percent circulation increase to slightly more than 2 million daily copies.

Details on the casualty report:

—The New York Times: -7.2 percent daily; -2.6 percent Sunday.
—The Los Angeles Times: -11 percent daily; -6.7 percent Sunday.
—The Washington Post: -6.4 percent daily; -5 percent Sunday.

E&P does explain the silver lining in this very dark storm cloud that has been hovering over the US newspaper industry for decades, especially over the last two years.

There are several reasons as to why circulation keeps dropping, aside from former readers who have kicked the print edition to the curb. Publishers have been purposely pulling back on certain types of circulation, including hotel, employee and third-party sponsored copies. No longer are they distributing newspapers to the outer reaches of the core market. The cost of delivery and the cost of materials have forced publishers to scale back.

Another shift has occurred: volume has taken a back seat to dollars.

Several major newspapers across the country have aggressively hiked prices of single-copy and home-delivered papers in search of circulation revenue and a renewed focus on loyal readers. Circulation is guaranteed to go down as prices go up, but publishers have opted to wring more revenue from readers as advertisers keep their coffers closed.

Several newspaper companies reported their circulation revenue is on the rise. In Q3, circulation revenue grew 6.7% at McClatchy, 11% at Media General, and 6.7% at The New York Times Co.

All the news that's fit to print does not seem enough for an industry that used to set the world standard.

Morocco Blocks Distribution of Le Monde because of Cartoon

2009-10-23T11:00:07-04:00

The cartoon, which drew an stern response from Rabat, underlines the case in Morocco of cartoonist Khalid Gueddar, whose trial for "lacking respect of the royal family" started 10 days ago in the city of Ain Sebaa, close to Casablanca.

The Le Monde cartoon (above), by artist Plantu, features a hand coming out of the Moroccan flag and drawing the figure of what looks like a crowned clown with the following legend: "Trial in Morocco against the caricaturist Khalid Gueddar who dares to draw the Moroccan royal family."

Gueddar's is the third trial against journalists in Morocco in one month, in what press freedom forces there call an unprecedented crackdown on press freedom.

The cartoon that could cost Gueddar dearly (above) deals with the wedding of a cousin of King Mohammed VI to a German woman.

Taoufik Bouachrine, the publisher of Akhbar al Youm, the paper that employs Gueddar, was also indicted for insulting the royal family. His paper has since been shut down by order of the Interior Ministry.

Reuters quoted Bouachrine as saying the indictments are part of "an ongoing massacre of press freedom" in Morocco.

A senior Moroccan official who chose to remain unnamed justified the banning of Thursday's and Friday's editions of Le Monde by saying, "We will never accept, on grounds of freedom of expression, a systematic attack on national symbols."

Two other journalists from the Al Michaal magazine are awaiting sentence after being tried for publishing allegedly false information about the health of king Mohammed. And the editor and a reporter of the daily Al Jarida al Oula are also on trial because of the same allegations.

Insult laws, created by the Roman Empire to shield the emperor from the criticism of the people, still constitute, 21 centuries later, some of the most effective tools to silence the media.

They also are the hallmark of paranoid regimes, terrified that a free press would keep the public informed.

Europe, US, Israel Star in RSF's Press Freedom Index, for Better or Worse

2009-10-21T11:19:49-04:00

Reporters without Borders (RSF) today issued its 2009 Press Freedom Index expressing deep concerns about the regression in several Western European countries, noticing the advance of the US and lamenting Israel's nosedive in the ranking.

RSF attributes the US advance, 16 positions, from 36th to 20th, to the "Obama effect," saying one important reason is "the fact that he has a less hawkish approach than his predecessor."

But the comments to the report wonder whether Europe, which still placed 13 of its countries on top of the list, is no longer the standard for the rest of the world, focusing on the dismal performances of Italy (49th, falling five positions), Slovakia (44th, falling 37) and France (43rd, falling eight).

Europe long set an example in press freedom but several European nations have fallen significantly in this year’s index (...) In so doing, they have given way to young democracies in Africa (Mali, South Africa and Ghana) and the western hemisphere (Uruguay and Trinidad and Tobago).

Journalists are still physically threatened in Italy and Spain (44th), but also in the Balkans, especially Croatia (78th), where the owner and marketing director of the weekly Nacional were killed by a bomb on 23 October 2008.

But the main threat, a more serious one in the long term, comes from new legislation. Many laws adopted since September 2008 have compromised the work of journalists. One adopted by Slovakia (44th) has introduced the dangerous concept of an automatic right of response and has given the culture minister considerable influence over publications.

Another big loser in this year's list was Israel, which fell 47 slots to 93rd overall.

This nose-dive means it has lost its place at the head of the Middle Eastern countries, falling behind Kuwait (60th), United Arab Emirates (86th) and Lebanon (61st).

Israel has begun to use the same methods internally as it does outside its own territory. Reporters Without Borders registered five arrests of journalists, some of them completely illegal, and three cases of imprisonment. The military censorship applied to all the media is also posing a threat to journalists.

As regards its extraterritorial actions, Israel was ranked 150th. The toll of the war was very heavy. Around 20 journalists in the Gaza Strip were injured by the Israeli military forces and three were killed while covering the offensive.

Bringing up the rear we find the usual suspects —Eritrea, North Korea and Turkmenistan— in close competition with Iran, which is "at the gates of the infernal trio."

RSF indicts the Tehran regime for its brutal repression of the pro-democracy demonstrations, "which plunged the country into a major crisis and fostered regime paranoia about journalists and bloggers."

Automatic prior censorship, state surveillance of journalists, mistreatment, journalists forced to flee the country, illegal arrests and imprisonment – such is the state of press freedom this year in Iran.

Already at the lower end of the rankings in previous years, Iran has now reached the gates of the infernal trio at the very bottom – Turkmenistan (173rd), North Korea (174th) and Eritrea (175th) – where the media are so suppressed they are non-existent.

On the bright side, special mention goes to Ireland, which jumped up to the first position, sharing it with the traditional stalwarts of international press freedom, Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden.

Journalist's Preventive Detention Upheld by Venezuelan Court

2009-10-19T19:06:48-04:00

A court in the Venezuelan state of Táchira upheld (available only in Spanish) a lower court's decision to keep journalist Gustavo Azócar (below) in preventive detention because of fraud and swindle charges.

(Photo by megaresistencia.com)

Azócar, who calls himself "the first journalist imprisoned by the Hugo Chávez Revolution," was imprisoned after a years-long criminal process for fraud and swindle charges related to the purchase of ads for his TV station. The charges have been repeatedly found baseless.

Azócar, a correspondent for the national daily El Universal in the Western city of San Cristóbal, insists the charges and his imprisonment are nothing but retribution for his criticism of the Chávez administration.

Venezuela's journalists union has demanded his immediate release and called his case a "perverse judicial situation."

China Sentences Dissident Guo Quan to 10 years in Prison

2009-10-19T18:35:53-04:00

Pro-democracy dissident and Internet writer Gou Quan (below), whose defiance of the Communist Party has cost him years of harassment and censorship, was sentenced to 10 years in prison and three years of deprivation of political rights for "subversion of state power."

(Epoch Times Photo)

Guo Quan, a former Nanjing Normal University associate professor, had become a thorn in the side of the Beijing bosses by sending letters to top officials advocating for a multi-party democracy system and by forming the independent Chinese New Democracy Party, which Guo Quan claims has a membership of 30 million.

In May of 2008, he was arrested because of his critical writings about the government's response to the May 12, 2008, earthquake in Sichuan Province. The PEN American Center called the arrest back then part of "a pattern of intensified harassment of dissident writers in China."

In November, he was arrested again on the above-mentioned charges of "subversion of state power," a case that was finally filed on June 20 and whose trial took place on Aug. 7.

According to Human Rights in China (HRIC), "In issuing a decision more than four months after it accepted the case, the court greatly exceeded the one-and-a-half month legal time limit for a court to conclude a case (Article 168, Criminal Procedure Law)."

HRIC also quotes Guo Quan's attorney as saying the whole procedure was illegal. "This sentence is indefensible from a legal perspective, because using peaceful and rational means to petition cannot be considered ‘subversion of state power.’ Guo Quan’s actions were in complete compliance with the constitutional guarantee of freedom of speech. ‘Subversion of state power’ can only be achieved by armed insurrection."

Maybe the judges read the old adage, "The pen is mightier than the sword." You never know.

'War on Words' and How Democratic Nations Deal with Hate Speech

2009-10-16T12:14:24-04:00

The International Press Institute and the Center for International Legal Studies recently held a conference in Vienna, Austria, about hate speech, one of the most controversial subjects confronting the international press freedom movement.

With the title "War on Words: Terrorism, Media and the Law," the conference attracted more than 150 journalists, human rights lawyers and advocates, and counter-terrorism experts from throughout the world.

Richard N. Winfield (above), WPFC's Chairman and one of the most prestigious media lawyers in the US, addressed the conference on this subject. Mr. Winfield dealt with the "kind of sociopathic expression that causes anger, hurt or resentment," and used examples from three countries, Denmark, Hungary and the United States, to illustrate his presentation.

Following are his complete remarks:

Hate Speech Laws: Ends and Means and Unintended Consequences

By Richard N. Winfield

Let us begin on common ground. Let us assume that we agree that hate speech is hurtful and evil. Let us agree that since hate speech offends human dignity, we should combat it. That is the goal, the end that we seek.

But what about means? Is it possible to disagree on the means, on how to combat hate speech? Is it possible to question the conventional wisdom that the only way, the best way, is to punish criminally the speaker who spews hate.

Let us look at the three different responses to hate speech in the three different countries. That comparison may help us shed some light on the usefulness of the convention of criminal punishment.

First, we will note that Denmark followed the conventional path. Its law criminally punished the offensive speech. But that law produced some unintended consequences.

Second, Hungary chose an unconventional path that differed from its neighbors in Europe. Hungary does not punish offensive speech that does not incite violence.

Third, we will consider some provocative American examples that illustrate the unwillingness of American courts to punish offensive speech.

First, we should be clear that we do not discuss speech that represents a true threat to an unwitting target. Nor will we discuss speech that constitutes advocacy of imminent violence with the likelihood that it would actually produce violence. No, we will discuss only that kind of sociopathic expression that causes anger, hurt or resentment. The kind of speech that the Danish cartoonists published.

Denmark
Let’s consider the role that Denmark’s hate speech and blasphemy laws played in the cartoon crisis. That crisis began when some Muslim groups protested to the newspaper about the cartoons. At first, the government was not involved. It was a controversy only between readers and editors. It was not to remain that way. The controversy necessarily had to escalate. It had to become politicized, it had to involve the government. The reason is simple enough. The government was required to act, the government had to do something. Why? Because Denmark’s hate speech law and blasphemy laws in the criminal code required the government to act. Once the protestors filed criminal complaints to demand prosecution, the government faced a politically toxic choice: either to prosecute (and favor the minority Muslim protestors) or not to prosecute (and favor the majority native Danes).

The two laws were sufficiently porous and vague to give the Muslim groups some basis to expect that the government would indict. We know that the riots only began, not when the cartoons were published, but three months later: immediately after the regional prosecutor announced his decision not to prosecute. The violence followed that decision, not the publication.

What can we draw from that sequence of events? The editorial controversy escalated into a politicized governmental crisis because the government could not escape becoming entangled. The availability of the broadly-worded laws transformed and escalated what had been a rancorous private exchange into a legal, political and governmental crisis.

The government became needlessly thrust into the controversy by possessing the explicit power to criminalize expression that was offensive. The Muslim groups viewed the decision not to prosecute as an official and hostile act of the Danish government.

If Denmark lacked the power to prosecute, that is, if the Hate Speech Laws and Blasphemy Laws were not on the books, the Danish government could not been held responsible. But the government became needlessly involved by possessing the explicit power to criminalize offensive expression.

In its efforts to maintain a legal arsenal enabling it to censor racial and religious insults, Denmark paid a very steep price. The two statutes were laws that produced unintended consequences.

Without the laws, the controversy would likely have remained local, non-governmental and containable.
The very existence of the laws caused a local controversy to escalate into a global, religious-governmental crisis.

Hungary
Our fellow panelist, on the next session, Professor Peter Molnar, speaks with far greater authority than any of us on this subject. As Peter will explain, Hungary chose a path different from its European neighbors.

It was the Constitutional Court of Hungary that departed from the response at other post-communist countries. A provision of the criminal code punished a public speaker before a large audience who used language that was offensive or denigrating to a religion or race. The Constitutional Court declared that law unconstitutional. However, a different provision punished a public speaker before a large audience who used speech that incited hatred on the basis of race or religion. In construing that incitement law, the Constitutional Court narrowed its application to only that speech that posed a clear and present danger that threatened individual rights. The Hungarian Supreme Court and lower courts have further narrowed the clear and present danger test by linking it to violence. Only if the conditions of inciting violence are met may speech be punished.

In the name of freedom of expression, Hungary has declined to criminalize anything except hateful speech that incites violence. That differentiates Hungary from its neighbors. The Constitutional Court was quite clear: “historical experience shows that on every occasion when the freedom of expression was restricted, social justice and humankinds’ innate ability to develop was stymied. . . . Free expression of ideas or beliefs, free manifestation of unpopular or unusual ideas is the fundamental requirement for the existence of a truly vibrant society capable of development.”

That philosophy represents Hungary’s response to hate speech.

United States
How American courts respond to hate speech in wartime is neatly summarized in an important case decided only two weeks ago.

There is a radical Christian fundamentalist preacher, who, with his family, loudly protest against Catholicism, homosexuality and the legal tolerance for homosexuality in the US. They regularly demonstrate their radical views at funerals for dead American soldiers.

Outside a Catholic church during one soldier’s funeral they held up signs which said “Thank God for Dead Soldiers,” “Pope in Hell,” “God hates the USA/Thank God for 9/11.”

Because of the signs, the parents of the dead soldier suffered emotional trauma. They brought suit against the preacher for intentional infliction of emotional distress and invasion of privacy. The jury awarded civil damages against the preacher for $11 million, including $8 million in punitive damages.

On September 24, the federal court of appeals unanimously reversed the award. The bereaved parents will receive nothing. The judges described the signs as distasteful and repugnant. Yet the judges found that the First Amendment fully protected this speech since it represents expressions of opinion rather than facts, and because it concerned matters of public interest and concern. For the courts to punish expression of these political and religious opinions because of their content would surely violate a core principle of democracy.

The American response is also summarized in the crisis about 30 years ago in Skokie, Illinois. Skokie is a village near Chicago with a population of 70,000. Of that number, about 40,000 were Jewish. Several thousands of those Jews had survived the Nazi death camps. You can imagine how they felt when an American Nazi party announced its plans to march through the streets of Skokie. Fifty to seventy Nazis would flaunt their swastikas and uniforms -- all the hated symbols of the Holocaust.

The village legislature responded by enacting local laws which, first, prohibited expression that would promote and incite hatred on the basis of heritage. A second law prohibited members of a political party from wearing military style uniforms.

Acting on these local laws, the local government denied the request of the Nazis for a permit to parade. The federal appeals court overturned the local laws. There was adequate police protection for both the Nazi marchers and those local citizens who chose to observe the display. No true threats were involved. Violence was not a real issue. The Court held that the swastikas, arm bands and banners were symbolic speech which the First Amendment protects. The Court said “Under the First Amendment, there is no such thing as a false idea. However pernicious an opinion may seem, we depend for its correction not on the consciences of judges and juries but on the competition of other ideas.”

But what about the impact on the sensitivities of the Jewish citizens? The court candidly recognized that the Nazis’ provocative display was deliberate and would disturb many of the citizens —if they chose to witness the parade. That was not enough to create a further exception to the First Amendment. That Amendment exists, the Court said, to invite dispute, to induce a condition of unrest, to create dissatisfaction with conditions as they are, or even to stirring people to anger.

After the intermediate appeals court nullified the local laws, the U.S. Supreme Court decided not to review the case. The First Amendment stands in the way of even a good-faith effort by a government body to censor or punish hateful expression of the kind that the Nazis planned.

America’s history and its jurisprudence generally leave it, not to the courts but to education and dialogue and pressures from civil society to marginalize, stigmatize and ostracize hate speech.

Finally, the question is not ends, but rather means. We looked at the means of combating hate speech that Denmark used –criminal punishment– and how Hungary and the U.S. reject those means. In our conversation, let us explore whether the cure that Denmark used is worse than the disease.