Free Press in Kurdistan, Take Two

So I tracked down the staff of Hawlati, the only inde­pen­dent news­pa­per in Kurdistan, to get their take on press free­dom in this coun­try so utterly dom­i­nated by two pow­er­ful polit­i­cal par­ties. Editor Faisal Khalid says that only Hawlati will tackle sto­ries related to gov­ern­ment cor­rup­tion, of which there is a lot in Kurdistan. In retal­i­a­tion, Hawlati staff have been threat­ened and, in a few cases, bribed by the gov­ern­ment to become infor­mants.
If the Hawlati staff believes an employee’s loy­alty is waver­ing, that employee is promptly fired. Recently three Hawlati reporters were jailed for cov­er­ing cor­rup­tion sto­ries; all three are out on bail await­ing trial. What makes this legally pos­si­ble is the absence of Miranda Rights in Kurdistan and a law pro­hibit­ing loosely-​​defined “slan­der”, which edi­tors have told me might include crit­i­cism of the major polit­i­cal par­ties.
Incredibly, even the coura­geous Hawlati staff cows away from cer­tain sub­jects. “Past the red line,” is how Khalid describes them. When I asked what sub­jects were past the line, he refused to answer, say­ing only that every­one knows what sub­jects are absolutely taboo. If gov­ern­ment cor­rup­tion is fair game in this place where gov­ern­ment is wor­shipped, what in the world is off-​​limits? My cyn­i­cal Western mind sus­pects that these sub­jects are related to sex and reli­gion. More on that later.
– David Axe

December 28th, 2005 | Axe in Iraq (and Elsewhere) | 30001 Comment »http://defensetech.org/2005/12/28/free-press-in-kurdistan-take-two/Free+Press+in+Kurdistan%2C+Take+Two2005-12-28+05%3A01%3A58jason You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.