Government gags ITV news over army revolt

[xmasdale]

Media Workers against the War have sent us this:

Government gags ITV news over army revolt

On Friday the Ministry of Defence formally banned ITV News teams from
access to British troops in Iraq an Afghanistan. The government is
angry at ITV’s investigation into treatment of wounded soldiers (watch
it here: www.itv.com/news/wounded.html)

In the past 5 years the army has relied on taming journalists by
“embedding” them with the military. But this move backfires when the
army is in revolt.

This is why the MoD is trying to bully the media into silence. As
Stuart Purvis, ITV’s chief executive, told Radio 4 news on Thursday:
“It comes within a climate … where there’s no doubt that the MoD would
clearly prefer for there not to be so much coverage as the media would
like to do in Afghanistan.” (Listen to it here:
www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/news/worldtonight)

The MoD’s move comes just two weeks after the inquest result into the
death of Terry Lloyd, an ITV journalist in Iraq who declined to be
embedded and was killed by American troops. Antipathy to the media
among the military endangers the lives of journalists who try to report
war.

Tonight’s MWAW meeting (see above) will issue a strong call to defend
ITV.

Read Raymond Whitaker’s excellent article in today’s Independent:
http://news.independent.co.uk/media/article1938284.ece


4. Defend the BBC’s reports from Afghanistan

If the attack on ITV wasn't bad enough, the Tories have branded as
“obscene” David Loyn’s brave reporting for Newsnight from behind
Taliban lines, while the Mail has accused the BBC of “undermining the
war effort”.

Loyn is one of the first journalists to have given us some insight into
just who the British army is slaughtering in such numbers in
Afghanistan -- taking the lives of hundreds of civilians at the same
time. Loyn therefore humanises the “enemy” and shows them to be poor
people angered by the corruption in the Karzai government and by the
failure of the occupation to improve their lives.

His report is required watching:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/6081594.stm

It comes at a time when the news that NATO massacred up to 85 civilians
last week has been completely buried in the news:
www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3-2422674,00.html

Please send your support to Newsnight’s editor Peter Barron:
www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/theeditors/2006/10/talking_to_the_enemy.html