Colombian journalist gets his U.S. visa

Colombian journalist Hollman Morris has received the authorization to enter the U.S. and take up his Nieman fellowship at Harvard University. This decision by the State Department responds to a campaign launched by press freedom organizations, like the Committee to Protect Journalists, and academics. Hollman Morris who has been exposing the links between rightwing paramilitaries and the outgoing conservative Uribe government had been accused of "links with the FARC guerillas", an accusation rejected by most neutral observers as a ploy of the government to defame and discredit its opponent.

http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2010/7/23/morris-state-nieman-human/

Amnesty International UK Media Awards 2010

I had failed to mention the Amnesty International UK Media Awards 2010, due to multiple travels and the gaps that this kind of jet hopping life creates in the flow of news.
Here is the info, published in early June, that I am sure you have already received. The awards celebrate in particular the courage of Burmese journalists that worked under brutal conditions to try report on and document the events in their country. Journalism as "conscience trigger", journalism as an essential tool for democracy and human rights, that is also the what these awards establish.

http://www.amnesty.org.uk/news_details.asp?NewsID=18785
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dFlD41d65SI&feature=related

Two brilliant examples of investigative journalism

Investigative journalism is an essential ally of human rights awareness and "name and shame" campaigns. Two recent examples should be highlighted hor their ambition and for the choice of their subject:
The Washington Post two-year long investigation into the top secret world created in the wake of the 9/11 attacks and the BBC research together with the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists into the global scourge of the asbestos industry.
See: http://projects.washingtonpost.com/top-secret-america/
http://www.publicintegrity.org/investigations/asbestos/

David Ignatius and Biz Stone, ICFJ laureates

Two media leaders will receive awards from the International Center for Journalists (ICFJ) for outstanding work. Washington Post Columnist David Ignatius will get the Founders Award for Excellence in Journalism for his commentary on international affairs. Twitter Co-Founder Biz Stone will receive ICFJ's first Innovation Award. His real-time information network has opened new ways to break news.

Biz Stone co-founded Twitter in 2006. More than 100 million people around the world share information on Twitter. In July, the site received 800 million searches in one day.

Citizens in Haiti used Twitter after the earthquake in January to share life-saving information. Last year, it was the main way international news outlets received real-time information about the protests in Iran. 'Extracts from the ICFJ press release.
See www.icfj.org

Haiti: how the media coped with the catastrophe and what to do now

The CIMA(Center for International Media Assistance, a branch of the Washington-based National Endowment for Democracy) has held a semianr on the impact of the Haiti earthquake on the media, especially local media.
The website offers information on how local media coped with the catastrophe (the worsening of already poor conditions for independent reporting but also the rise of social media). It also discusses how the restoration of a working media system should be an integral part of the reconstruction of the country.
See: www.cima.ned.org

No U.S. visa for a Harvard fellow

The U.S. denial of a visa to Colombian TV producer Hollman Morris -invited for a Harvard University fellowship - has been condemned by prominent press freedom and human rights organizations, like the Committee to Protect Journalists, and by mainstream and liberal media.
Charges by the Colombian government that Morris is an "ally of terrorists" have not been sustantiated, writes the CPJ, who also describes the Uribe government's tactics of spying upon, harassing and defaming "troublesome journalists".
Hollman Morris has been investigating the dark side of President Uribe's antiguerilla war and documenting rights abuses by government-allied forces.
This visa denial reminds the days of the Cold War when an ill-advised policy "barring communists" to the U.S. led to denying visas to leading intellectuals like Mexican writer Carlos Fuentes who were closer to president Lincoln than to Karl Marx.

http://cpj.org/2010/07/cpj-urges-clinton-to-reconsider-morris-visa-denial.php

Thomas Friedman at the rescue of ex-CNN Middle East editor

The firing of CNN senior editor of Middle East affairs, Octavia Nasr, has triggered a vibrant buzz over the Internet. The Lebanese Christian journalist has been lynched for tweeting her condolences for Sayyed Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah, a prominent Shiite spiritual leader who was also involved in the founding of the Hezbollah militia.
The former CNN journalist has received support from rather unexpected quarters: the New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman, not known for his sympathy for radical islamists. His arguments deserve to be read because it provides rationality in a debate that, like so many other "buzzes" on the Internet, prosper on stigmatisation, hate, defamation and manicheism.
Friedman agrees that Octavia Nasr "made a mistake" (Reporters should not be issuing condolences for any of the actors they cover" and he does hide Fadlallah's "dark side" but he also gives the floor to academics and pundits that describe the defunct in much more nuanced ways.
Friedman's main argument is also about the U.S. free speech rationale: should the U.S. media ban all speech that offends someone, can a country like the U.S. make do without the opinions and insight of people that might be politically incorrect but knowledgeable about other countries and cultures?

Pius Njawe and the Paris African leaders' summit

The accidental death in the U.S. of Pius Njawe, the crusading editor of Cameroon, has come as a shock to all press freedom advocates.
Pius had become the symbol of Africans’ fight for independent reporting, the kind of reporting that most Francophone African leaders invited at the French-Francophone Africa summit currently held in Paris do not really appreciate.
In Brussels Pius was a frequent visitor. During his imprisonment he had been supported by a wide and active coalition of publishers, journalists and students that had been seduced by his energy, courage and gentle ways.
To know more about the circumstances of his death and about the context of the press freedom challenges in Francophone Africa, please read Rob Mahoney’s blog on www.cpj.org as well as the letter sent by a coalition of press freedom groups to the African leaders and their host Nicolas Sarkozy in Paris. Both texts insist in particular on the new ways African chiefs of state have been able to use “soft” censorship tools to marginalize dissenting voices.

Conflict reporting in Kyrgysztan

The OSCE Centre summarizes the lessons from a recent seminar on conflict reporting held in Bishkek.
Local journalists indeed did not always meet international standards, says the report. For more infor please go to the OSCE centre.

http://www.osce.org/bishkek/item_1_45253.html