July 5, 2006

World Media Watch

Edited by Gloria R. Lalumia

BuzzFlash Note: WMW provides BuzzFlash readers foreign views and perspectives that are not usually available from the media here in the U.S. The presentation of these articles from these international publications is not an endorsement of their viewpoints.

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WORLD MEDIA WATCH FOR JULY 5, 2006

1//The Independent, UK--BRITISH TROOPS FACING AIR SUPPLY CRISIS IN AFGHANISTAN (British forces in Afghanistan are facing a supply crisis because nearly half of their helicopter transport fleet is unable to fly in daylight hours due to the searing Helmand heat. … Brigadier Ed Butler, the commander of British forces in the south, admitted he had made a request for new equipment in Helmand amid a sharp increase in attacks and "changing circumstances". Five British soldiers have been killed in Afghanistan in the past three weeks.)

2//The Chosun Ilbo, South Korea--U.S. CONGRESS ASKED ABOUT BOOSTING UN COMMAND IN KOREA (The U.S. Congress has asked the Department of Defense and the State Department to report on chances of reviving UN Command in Korea, a body nominally still made up of countries that took part on the South’s side in the Korean War. The move comes in the midst of plans to dissolve Korea-U.S. Combined Forces Command, return wartime operational control of forces to Korea and other signs of a lesser role for the U.S. forces in the country. Under Article 1221 of the National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal year 2007, which passed the Senate on June 22, the secretaries of defense and state must issue a joint report on the matter to committees in both houses of Congress. … U.S. Forces Commander Burwell Bell earlier told a congressional hearing he planned to revive the international alliance by increasing international staff at the UNC, which is now effectively in sole U.S. control, writing up emergency and operational plans, and training observation.)

3//The Daily Star, Lebanon--IRAN SETS IN MOTION PLAN TO DISTRIBUTE SHARES TO POOR (Iran's populist President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is to distribute shares in state industries among the poor, in line with his election pledges, state television reported Tuesday. The Islamic Republic's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, unveiled Monday a privatization scheme for basic industries, amending an article of the Constitution that had banned private ownership of state institutions. With his approval, 50 percent of the shares are to be allocated for sale to provincial cooperative companies, with the focus on low-income sectors of society, under Ahmadinejad's plan for the "distribution of justice shares." … Khamenei's order does not affect the oil and gas industry in Iran. The country is the second largest oil exporter in the 11-member Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries and the fourth largest in the world. Ahmadinejad, who took office last August, said in mid-May that he planned to reverse privatizations carried out by the former reformist government. "Within the framework of privatization, public properties and factories worth billions of rials [millions of dollars] were sold off at cheap prices to some groups," he charged. The president's so-called "justice shares" have seen shares allocated to one third of the population who are selected from the lowest-income group, or about 21 million people.)

4//The Guardian, UK--CHINA’S MEDIA FACES FINES FOR REPORTING DISASTERS (China, the world's biggest censor, is planning to tighten its controls on the media with a new law that would impose financial penalties on news organisations that report on emergencies without permission. Despite opposition from mainland and Hong Kong journalists who say it is a step backwards for press freedom, state council officials expect the legislation to be adopted by the end of the year. Under the draft law, newspapers and TV channels face fines of up to £7,000 for unauthorised reports on natural disasters, accidents, public health incidents and public safety disturbances deemed misleading or harmful to social order. If adopted, this would close the biggest loophole for domestic reporters who try to beat the censors by putting out stories before they are banned. Foreign and Hong Kong news outlets, which have previously faced fewer restrictions than their mainland Chinese counterparts, will also be liable to fines. … Chinese officials said the new law was primarily intended to penalise local governments that are slow to release information about public emergencies. They said news outlets would be punished only if they made mistakes or their reporting had "grave social consequences". … Serenade Woo Lai-wan, chairwoman of the Hong Kong Journalists Association, told the South China Morning Post: "The public has the right to know and reporters have the right to report. We are under one country, two systems. The two legal systems are different. I don't see why Hong Kong journalists have to follow this regulation.")

5//Mail & Guardian, South Africa-- ETHIOPIA: TERRORISTS RULE MOGADISHU (Members of a group listed by the United States as a terrorist band are now running the capital of neighbouring Somalia, days after Islamic fighters wrested control of the city from warlords, Ethiopia's Prime Minister Meles Zenawi said on Tuesday. "The renowned extremist and terrorist organisation, al-Ittihad, is at the helm of the current leadership in Mogadishu," Meles told lawmakers during a review of the situation in Ethiopian relations with neighbouring countries. "We do not believe that all the forces that have taken control of Mogadishu and its surroundings are extremists." … Despite the dramatic rise to power of the extremists, most residents and members of the group running Mogadishu are only interested in ending 15 years of anarchy and restoring peace and stability in the country, Meles said. Still, Ethiopia is closely watching developments in Somalia and has deployed troops and military hardware on the border separating the two countries. Ethiopian officials have previously accused al-Ittihad combatants of training, arming and helping Ethiopia's ethnic Somali and Oromo separatist fighters. "Our beef is with al-Ittihad ... It so happens that at the moment the new leadership of the union of the courts is dominated by this particular group," Meles told journalists last week. "Now, the threat posed to Ethiopia by the dominance of the Islamic courts, by al-Ittihad is obvious.)

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1//The Independent, UK Published: 05 July 2006

BRITISH TROOPS FACING AIR SUPPLY CRISIS IN AFGHANISTAN
By Tom Coghlan in Kabul

British forces in Afghanistan are facing a supply crisis because nearly half of their helicopter transport fleet is unable to fly in daylight hours due to the searing Helmand heat.

The 3,300 British troops in the south rely on six Chinook and four Lynx aircraft for all transport and supply. The extreme heat and thin, rising air of the Helmand desert has limited the Lynx, an attack and utility helicopter, to use between dusk and dawn, when temperatures fall to acceptable levels, military sources confirmed.

Captain Drew Gibson, the British military spokesman with the Helmand force, declined to comment on the Lynx problems, citing "operational reasons". Lt Rob Hunt, the military spokesman in Kabul, said: "The Lynx is just one of a range of aircraft available to ground commanders in theatre. All air assets have their own operating margin and this is true of the Lynx. They are still a valued and useful asset in theatre, whatever their operating restrictions."

Brigadier Ed Butler, the commander of British forces in the south, admitted he had made a request for new equipment in Helmand amid a sharp increase in attacks and "changing circumstances". Five British soldiers have been killed in Afghanistan in the past three weeks.

(MORE)

2//The Chosun Ilbo, South Korea Updated July.4, 2006 19:41 KST

U.S. CONGRESS ASKED ABOUT BOOSTING UN COMMAND IN KOREA

The U.S. Congress has asked the Department of Defense and the State Department to report on chances of reviving UN Command in Korea, a body nominally still made up of countries that took part on the South’s side in the Korean War. The move comes in the midst of plans to dissolve Korea-U.S. Combined Forces Command, return wartime operational control of forces to Korea and other signs of a lesser role for the U.S. forces in the country.

Under Article 1221 of the National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal year 2007, which passed the Senate on June 22, the secretaries of defense and state must issue a joint report on the matter to committees in both houses of Congress.

The act outlines five areas the report must cover, focusing on analysis of what political and military effect it would have on the U.S. Forces Korea if member nations of U.N. Command put troops on the peninsula. The report will cover contributions and roles of all UNC member countries, which have been inactive for decades, efforts of the U.S. to increase UNC responsibility, the possibility of convincing other member countries to increase their numbers as a peacetime deterrent against the North, which countries could be persuaded, and whether adding troops would be of diplomatic help in resolving the North Korean nuclear threat.

(SNIP)

U.S. Forces Commander Burwell Bell earlier told a congressional hearing he planned to revive the international alliance by increasing international staff at the UNC, which is now effectively in sole U.S. control, writing up emergency and operational plans, and training observation.

3//The Daily Star, Lebanon Wednesday, July 05, 2006

IRAN SETS IN MOTION PLAN TO DISTRIBUTE SHARES TO POOR
By Agence France Presse (AFP)

TEHRAN: Iran's populist President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is to distribute shares in state industries among the poor, in line with his election pledges, state television reported Tuesday.

The Islamic Republic's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, unveiled Monday a privatization scheme for basic industries, amending an article of the Constitution that had banned private ownership of state institutions.

With his approval, 50 percent of the shares are to be allocated for sale to provincial cooperative companies, with the focus on low-income sectors of society, under Ahmadinejad's plan for the "distribution of justice shares."

The authorities have yet to announce when Ahmadinejad's program, which now has Khamenei's blessing, is expected to be launched.

The scheme has drawn criticism from economic experts who fear it could set up a parallel stock market. But Khamenei has ordered the shares to be distributed under the state's official stock market system.

The government plans to sell off 80 percent of its stake in a range of state-run industrial companies in the banking, media, transportation and mineral sectors under the order issued by Khamenei.

Khamenei's order does not affect the oil and gas industry in Iran. The country is the second largest oil exporter in the 11-member Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries and the fourth largest in the world.

Ahmadinejad, who took office last August, said in mid-May that he planned to reverse privatizations carried out by the former reformist government.

"Within the framework of privatization, public properties and factories worth billions of rials [millions of dollars] were sold off at cheap prices to some groups," he charged.

The president's so-called "justice shares" have seen shares allocated to one third of the population who are selected from the lowest-income group, or about 21 million people.

Beneficiaries of Ahmadinejad's proposals can pay for the shares - sold at one-third of their estimated value - over a maximum period of 20 years, but they can not be sold on during the first four years.

Khamenei's approval provides for the government at a later stage to identify the low-income class entitled to shares at half of the stock market price, to be repaid in installments over 10 years.

(MORE)

4//The Guardian, UK 12:15 PM Tuesday July 4, 2006

CHINA’S MEDIA FACES FINES FOR REPORTING DISASTERS
Jonathan Watts in Beijing
China, the world's biggest censor, is planning to tighten its controls on the media with a new law that would impose financial penalties on news organisations that report on emergencies without permission.
Despite opposition from mainland and Hong Kong journalists who say it is a step backwards for press freedom, state council officials expect the legislation to be adopted by the end of the year.

Under the draft law, newspapers and TV channels face fines of up to £7,000 for unauthorised reports on natural disasters, accidents, public health incidents and public safety disturbances deemed misleading or harmful to social order.

If adopted, this would close the biggest loophole for domestic reporters who try to beat the censors by putting out stories before they are banned. Foreign and Hong Kong news outlets, which have previously faced fewer restrictions than their mainland Chinese counterparts, will also be liable to fines.

The controversial bill has been more than two years in the drafting. It was first mooted in the aftermath of the Sars crisis, when China's most daring news organisations broke new ground in exposing official cover-ups of the disease. Their reports, which were constantly a step ahead of the censors, led to the resignation of the health minister and Beijing's mayor.

In the years since, the Communist authorities have responded by rolling back media freedoms, closing down publications and locking up some of the most prominent editors who exposed the Sars outbreak. According to one international organisation, the Committee to Protect Journalists, China imprisons more journalists than any other country, with 32 domestic reporters currently in jail. In addition, Reporters without Borders says 64 cyber-dissidents are in prison.

Several newspapers, websites and blogs have been shut down, editors have been fired, and more sophisticated restrictions have been imposed on online content and the use of internet cafes.

Chinese officials said the new law was primarily intended to penalise local governments that are slow to release information about public emergencies. They said news outlets would be punished only if they made mistakes or their reporting had "grave social consequences".

Wang Yongqing, vice-minister of the state council's legislative affairs office, told reporters: "Journalists and media organisations have worked very hard to contribute to covering emergencies but I must say that some individual journalists have filed wrong reports or even fabricated facts."

News organisations fear the vague wording of the law will allow local officials to interpret it in a way that prevents corruption scandals, land protests, disease outbreaks and mining accidents from coming to light.

(SNIP)

Hong Kong news organisations - which break many stories that the censors block on the mainland - say the new law would erode the freedom they enjoy under the "one-party, two-systems" arrangement covering the territory's relationship with the rest of China.

Serenade Woo Lai-wan, chairwoman of the Hong Kong Journalists Association, told the South China Morning Post: "The public has the right to know and reporters have the right to report. We are under one country, two systems. The two legal systems are different. I don't see why Hong Kong journalists have to follow this regulation."

5//Mail & Guardian, South Africa 04 July 2006 05:55

ETHIOPIA: TERRORISTS RULE MOGADISHU
Les Neuhaus, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

Members of a group listed by the United States as a terrorist band are now running the capital of neighbouring Somalia, days after Islamic fighters wrested control of the city from warlords, Ethiopia's Prime Minister Meles Zenawi said on Tuesday.

"The renowned extremist and terrorist organisation, al-Ittihad, is at the helm of the current leadership in Mogadishu," Meles told lawmakers during a review of the situation in Ethiopian relations with neighbouring countries.

"We do not believe that all the forces that have taken control of Mogadishu and its surroundings are extremists."

Al-Ittihad is listed by the US as a terrorist group linked to al-Qaeda. Washington has accused the group of harbouring al-Qaeda leaders responsible for deadly 1998 bombings at the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania.

United Nations officials say al-Ittihad operates openly as a religious organisation and is a powerful economic force in southern Somalia, where it captured key towns from warlords in June.

UN experts monitoring an arms embargo on lawless Somalia described Sheikh Hassan Dahir Aweys -- head of the powerful consultative council of the group that controls Mogadishu -- as the al-Ittihad leader responsible for overseeing military training.

The military trainers for what constitutes "al-Ittihad's de facto army" reportedly include several Afghans and Yemenis, UN experts said in a report released early last year.

Aweys, however, has denied being al-Ittihad's leader and said the group has disbanded.

Despite the dramatic rise to power of the extremists, most residents and members of the group running Mogadishu are only interested in ending 15 years of anarchy and restoring peace and stability in the country, Meles said.

Still, Ethiopia is closely watching developments in Somalia and has deployed troops and military hardware on the border separating the two countries.

Ethiopian officials have previously accused al-Ittihad combatants of training, arming and helping Ethiopia's ethnic Somali and Oromo separatist fighters.

"Our beef is with al-Ittihad ... It so happens that at the moment the new leadership of the union of the courts is dominated by this particular group," Meles told journalists last week. "Now, the threat posed to Ethiopia by the dominance of the Islamic courts, by al-Ittihad is obvious.

(MORE)