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Al-Jadeed editor demands STL apologize for 'attack' on media




Al-Jadeed editor demands STL apologize for 'attack' on media

BEIRUT: The prosecution should apologize for targeting Lebanese journalists, Al-Jadeed news editor Karma Khayat told the Special Tribunal for Lebanon Thursday on the first day of her trial over carrying reports on alleged witnesses.

Speaking after prosecutor Kenneth Scott accused Al-Jadeed of endangering lives by airing a series of reports in 2012 disclosing personal details of alleged witnesses, Khayat said the court was waging an "attack on investigative journalism."

"The power is with you, but the right is with us, and he who has the right fears nothing," a defiant Khayat declared before the The Hague-based court set up to investigate the 2005 assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri.

The court is trying five Hezbollah members in absentia over alleged involvement in the Downtown Beirut blast, which killed Hariri and 21 others.

But last year, the court announced that it was also charging Khayat and Al-Jadeed's parent company, and Lebanese newspaper Al-Akhbar and its editor-in-chief Ibrahim al-Amin, with obstruction of justice and contempt of court for reports carried on alleged prosecution witnesses.

The court has "diverted the path of justice" by going after journalists, Khayat said, insisting that it was the right of Lebanon's media to investigate how the country's $500 million in public funds spent to create the tribunal were being used.

Turning the tables on the court, she ran through a list of examples of when it released identifying information on witnesses that she said may have endangered their lives.

She also pointed out that other media have published secret court information without facing charges, attempting to show how Al-Jadeed is being targeted for actions that have been taken by the court itself and other foreign news agencies.

Lead prosecutor Scott should admit that journalists in Lebanon are as free as journalists in the West, Khayat added, calling on him to admit to the court that he made an error by prosecuting Al-Jadeed, and apologize.

In his opening statement, Scott said that freedom of expression had limits. He insisted that the case against Al-Jadeed had nothing to do with the right to criticize the court, saying there was wide space for criticism.

Rather, it was about protecting witnesses, their families and livelihoods, he said. Reports such as those carried by Al-Jadeed hamper the court's ability to gather and collect evidence, Scott added.

"No judge can say that this is the first time or a rare instance in which a journalist is charged with contempt of the court," he said, claiming that "most international tribunals have tried journalists for contempt, and most of them were convicted."

Scott presented evidence he said indicated Al-Jadeed’s intent to “undermine the court's work and intimidate its witnesses.”

Khayat has said that the reports on the alleged witnesses were carried to alert the court of leaks.

But Scott said leaks inside the court were never discovered, accusing the television station of a campaign to undermine the court by alleging leaks that did not exist.

"Maybe this information came from monitoring the witnesses and their movements, or from hacks, or from phone tappings. Maybe the information was stolen or collected from different sources and not one source," Scott said.

"But Al-Jadeed never confirmed that the information was leaked from the court. In fact the evidence will suggest that Al-Jadeed did not know where this information came from," he added.

He said that Al-Jadeed's broadcasts revealed identifying information of the alleged witnesses such as their voices, their vehicle license plate numbers.

"These alleged witnesses were contacted by friends and family members who expressed their worries over the broadcast," Scott said.

Defense attorney Karim Khan, who is representing both Khayat and Al-Jadeed, said the prosecution could not prove criminal intent since interviews with alleged witnesses blurred the faces of those individuals and withheld their names to protect them. He also noted that Al-Jadeed's decision to not release the full list of names of alleged witnesses also indicated that there was no criminal intent.

No alleged witness was ever threatened or had their life put in danger as a result of the reports, Khan added.


 














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