press

The U.S.-backed right-wing coup government of Jeanine Añez continues its moves against media and other dissenting voices. The latest victim of the crackdown was Marcelo Hurtado, president of the ATB media network. Hurtado was paraded before cameras; handcuffed and forced to wear a vest labeled “arrested.” He was flanked by two black clad, masked and armed members of the country’s infamous police, who led a successful coup against socialist president Evo Morales in November.

Newspapers and other media in the United States, Britain and Australia have recently declared a passion for freedom of speech, especially their right to publish freely.  They are worried by the “Assange effect”.  
It is as if the struggle of truth-tellers like Julian Assange and Chelsea Manning is now a warning to them: that the thugs who dragged Assange out of the Ecuadorean embassy in April may one day come for them.

The lifeblood of alternative radio is sometimes the celebrity that they create among themselves. And on Monday, October 7, Lincoln County’s KYAQ radio station will welcome one of the biggest stars from the bottom of the dial as David Barsamian visits Newport, Oregon on his Rise Up and Resist tour.
Barsamian grew up in New York, the son of Armenian refugees who fled the genocide unleashed in Turkey by the Ottoman government from 1915 to 1917. More than 1.5 million people were murdered.

As famed Latin American author Eduardo Galeano once wrote, “every time the US ‘saves’ a country, it converts it into either an insane asylum or a cemetery.” Of course, as we look over the wreckage left by the US in countries such as Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Somalia, Syria, El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras, we see that this statement is demonstrably true. And yet, now that the US is poised for another intervention, this time in Venezuela, the press is right there again to cheer it along.

For seven years, from the moment Julian Assange first sought refuge in the Ecuadorean embassy in London, they have been telling us we were wrong, that we were paranoid conspiracy theorists. We were told there was no real threat of Assange’s extradition to the United States, that it was all in our fevered imaginations.

Journalists and free press advocates are responding with alarm to newly released documents revealing the U.S.

Three separate journalists, not for Palestinian news outlets, have reported being attacked by Israeli forces. While Israel says that it carefully considers each shot fired, if believed, would leave no other conclusion than that the IDF was intentionally trying to harm or liquidate journalists covering the conflict on the Israeli border. Specific information was reported by an Al-Jazeera reporter, who gave the following report to France24 news:

After Yaser Murtaja, Ahmed Abu Hussein, another Gazan photojournalist‎, who was seriously injured last Friday while documenting the March of Return, succumbed to injuries Wednesday afternoon, Gaza’s Health Ministry has said.
Hussein‎ was stationed at a permissible distance from the border fence when an Israeli sniper shot the 24-year-old journalist in the stomach, causing grave injuries.
Hussein‎ was working as a photojournalist for Gaza’s Al-Shaab radio station and wore a protective vest marked “Press” at the protest on April 13, witnesses said, according to Reuters.

Members of the media try to get a question with President Donald Trump during a news conference, Thursday, Feb. 16, 2017, in the East Room of the White House in Washington. (AP/Andrew Harnik)

US President Donald Trump sat down with his South Korean counterpart Moon Jae-in to take questions from the media.
Throughout the meeting, aggressive reporters and camera crews were pushing and shoving to get the best shot of the two leaders.
During the ensuing chaos, one reporter slammed into a table, knocking over a lamp that nearly fell on the American President. A quick thinking security guard caught the lamp before it broke on the US President’s lap.
Donald Trump scolded the press, telling them to “take it easy”.