WTI statement

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http://www.dahrjamailiraq.com/hard_news/archives/hard_news/000198.php
http://www.worldtribunal.org/

ROME, Feb 14 (IPS) - A peoples tribunal has held much of
Western media guilty of inciting violence and deceiving
people in its reporting of Iraq.

The World Tribunal on Iraq (WTI), an international peoples
initiative seeking the truth about the war and occupation in
Iraq made its pronouncement Sunday after a three- day
meeting. The tribunal heard testimony from independent
journalists, media professors, activists, and member of the
European Parliament Michele Santoro.

The Rome session of the WTI followed others in Brussels,
London, Mumbai, New York, Hiroshima-Tokyo, Copenhagen,
Stockholm and Lisbon. The Rome meeting focused on the media
role.

The informal panel of WTI judges accused the United States
and the British governments of impeding journalists in
performing their task, and intentionally producing lies and
misinformation.

The panel accused western corporate media of filtering and
suppressing information, and of marginalising and
endangering independent journalists. More journalists were
killed in a 14-month period in Iraq than in the entire
Vietnam war.

The tribunal said mainstream media reportage on Iraq also
violated article six of the Nuremberg Tribunal (set up to
try Nazi crimes) which states: "Leaders, organisers,
instigators and accomplices participating in the formulation
or execution of a common plan or conspiracy to commit any of
the foregoing crimes (crimes against peace, war crimes and
crimes against humanity) are responsible for all acts
performed by any persons in execution of such a plan."

The panel that heard testimonies included Francois Houtart,
director of the Tricontinental Centre in Belgium that has
backed several peoples movements in Latin America, and Dr.
Samir Amin, director of the Third World Forum in Dakar,
Senegal. Dr. Haleh Afshar, who teaches politics and women's
studies at the University of York in Britain, and Italian
author and newspaper editor Ernesto Pallotta witnessed the
proceedings.

"This is not simply an exercise to denounce the mainstream
media for their bias and incompetence," said Dr. Tony
Alessandrini, a human rights activist who has published
several articles on the U.S. colonisation of Iraq. "These
denunciations have been going on for months. Here in Rome,
we must go further.."

Alessandrini, who helped organised the WTI added, "What we
are being asked to consider is not simply media bias, but
rather the active complicity of media in crimes that have
been committed and are being committed on a daily basis
against the people in Iraq."

Several experts gave strong testimony. Dr. Peter Philips,
director of 'Project Censured' at Sonoma State University in
California where he teaches media censorship provided taped
testimony. He said that at no time since the 1930s has the
United States been so close to "institutionalised
totalitarianism", and added, "U.S. society has become the
least informed, best entertained society in the world."

The WTI Rome session also heard testimony from Dr. David
Miller from Scotland, author of 'Tell Me Lies: Propaganda
and Media Distortion in the Attack on Iraq'. "This is about
condemning journalistic complicity of war crimes," said Dr.
Miller, who is also co-editor of Spinwatch, a group that
monitors public relations and propaganda.

Miller said the Pentagon "does not recognise the concept of
independent journalists, because they are providers of
unfriendly information", and that mainstream media in the
United States and in Britain was "complicit in furthering
the selling of the invasion, and ongoing occupation. All
studies conducted on mainstream media show dominance by
government policies, and wartime coverage of TV news in the
UK was generally sympathetic to the government's case.."

Fernando Suarez, who lost his son Jesus during the invasion
of Iraq when he is said to have stepped on an illegal U.S.
cluster bomb, also testified at the tribunal.

Suarez testified that he was first told by the Pentagon that
his son died from a gunshot to the head, then that he died
in an accident, and then that he had died in 'friendly fire'.

On inspecting his son's body Suarez said he discovered that
his son had died from stepping on a cluster bomb.

"I never had the truth from them," Suarez added. "I found
the truth, and the truth was very simple. On March 26 the
Army dropped 20,000 cluster bombs in Iraq, but only about 20
percent exploded. The other 80 percent are in the cities and
the schools and acting like mines."

Suarez said: "Bush sent my son because he said Iraq had
illegal weapons, and my son died from an illegal American
weapon, and nobody has spoken about this. The media will not
talk about the illegal American weapons."

Several witnesses testified about media disinformation over
the siege of Fallujah. They were presented copies of the
award winning documentary 'Weapons of Mass Deception' by
journalist and film-maker Danny Schechter, who is also
executive editor of Mediachannel.org, an online media issues
network.

Alessandrini said evidence of active complicity of the
mainstream media in wrongs committed against the people of
Iraq, and the wrongs of deception and incitement, was now
overwhelming.

"We work from the understanding that history will recall the
crimes committed against the people of Iraq by the U.S.," he
said. "It is our responsibility to record these crimes in
order to ensure these crimes are never again repeated.”

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