Asked about restrictions, violence against media, President Talabani insists Iraqi journalists are freest in Middle East

Reporters Without Borders met with visiting Iraqi President Jalal Talabani yesterday in Paris, voicing concern about the mounting difficulties for journalists in Iraq including the increasing violence being targeted at them. At least 128 journalists and media assistants have been killed there since the start of the war in March 2003. President Talabani said Iraqi journalists were among the freest in the Middle East. He described a thriving press with more than 100 dailies and journalists who are free to criticise the authorities and government decisions. The new Iraqi state has never given orders for any journalist to be killed, he stressed. Reporters Without Borders pointed out that journalists are facing not only violence but also many restrictions in the course of their work. Journalists, mostly Iraqi ones, have been subjected to curbs on their freedom of movement and professional freedom, including bans on filming religious festivities, the army or police, and members of parliament. Since the start of the summer, Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri Al-Maliki has repeatedly threatened to use a 2004 anti-terrorism law to close down media that “incite violence.” Reporters Without Borders secretary-general Robert Ménard asked President Talabani to ensure that this law, which provides for long prison terms for journalists who incite “sedition and sectarianism” is not applied in a draconian fashion. Reporters Without Borders also queried the government's closure of two privately-owned TV stations on 5 November after they broadcast images of demonstrators protesting against Saddam Hussein's death sentence. The organisation asked Talabani to authorise the reopening of the Baghdad bureau of the pan-Arab satellite TV station Al-Jazeera, which has been closed since August 2004. Talabani said negotiations were under way with the station's regional director to work out a “compromise.” He said “many Baathists” worked at the station and that it was “hostile to Iraq.” Finally, Reporters Without Borders brought up the case of French journalist Frédéric Nérac, who disappeared without a trace near the southern city of Basra during the first few days of the war. After voicing fears about Nérac's fate, President Talabani said one of his priorities was to secure Iraq and thereby ensure that journalists can work more freely. A plan for securing Baghdad, the deadliest city for civilians, was under study, he added.