Saturday, August 24, 2013

Egypt: repression

From Al Jazeera, Egypt: Are foreign journalists lying?, Inside Story, 20/8:
 But while criticism has been levelled at the foreign press - the government has said nothing about local media coverage. The local media scene has been dominated by one narrative, while the others are attacked, there are similarities to the Mubarak era when there was no free press to speak of. The military rulers say they are leading the country in a march towards democracy, but it is increasingly starting to look like a giant step back.
One of the guests in the following discussion, though, says that Morsi's year in power saw attacks by his supporters on private media channels that took an anti-Morsi line. There has been a failure since 2011, including under Morsi, to reform the legal framework of the media.

From the Boston Herald / AP, 20/8:
In addition to the arrests, a campaign is in full swing to "cleanse" ministries, government departments and state media of Brotherhood supporters, dismantling a network built during Morsi's year in office. Employees known to have taken part in sit-ins or protests are being brought before disciplinary panels to account for not showing up for work. 
Kristen Chick,  in The Christian Science Monitor, August 21:
Since [Aug. 14], many Brotherhood members have been on the run, not returning to their homes at night and switching off their phones for fear of arrest. Many who had been active on Facebook and Twitter are no longer posting. Spokesman Gehad el Haddad said many mid-level leaders were killed in the dispersal of the sit-in, including 12 he knew personally.
[..]
Mohamed Okda, an alliance spokesman, said the group held a meeting Sunday, but he only found out about it just before it was to begin. “Communication within the coalition is very difficult right now,” he said after the meeting. “No one is talking on the phone. For me to know about this meeting, it was through maybe three intermediaries who managed to get to me and tell me we were meeting today.”
In addition to the arrests, a campaign is in full swing to "cleanse" ministries, government departments and state media of Brotherhood supporters, dismantling a network built during Morsi's year in office. Employees known to have taken part in sit-ins or protests are being brought before disciplinary panels to account for not showing up for work. - See more at: http://bostonherald.com/news_opinion/international/middle_east/2013/08/egypts_brotherhood_as_beleaguered_as_its_leader#sthash.jekohuFP.LgHbc1IO.dpuf
In addition to the arrests, a campaign is in full swing to "cleanse" ministries, government departments and state media of Brotherhood supporters, dismantling a network built during Morsi's year in office. Employees known to have taken part in sit-ins or protests are being brought before disciplinary panels to account for not showing up for work. - See more at: http://bostonherald.com/news_opinion/international/middle_east/2013/08/egypts_brotherhood_as_beleaguered_as_its_leader#sthash.jekohuFP.LgHbc1IO.dpuf
In addition to the arrests, a campaign is in full swing to "cleanse" ministries, government departments and state media of Brotherhood supporters, dismantling a network built during Morsi's year in office. Employees known to have taken part in sit-ins or protests are being brought before disciplinary panels to account for not showing up for work. - See more at: http://bostonherald.com/news_opinion/international/middle_east/2013/08/egypts_brotherhood_as_beleaguered_as_its_leader#sthash.jekohuFP.LgHbc1IO.dpuf
Joshua Hersh in The New Yorker, Egypt’s Media Counter-Revolution, 21/8:  :
  “It’s very clear to everybody now that there is a conspiracy against Egypt. Why aren’t we taking measures against these people?” [Saturday night in Cairo ..] But when it came time for local reporters to ask questions, many of them seemed enthralled by the government’s version of events. One wondered why the government wasn’t taking action against opposition figures who met with officials at the American embassy. (It was this reporter who mentioned a “conspiracy.”) [..] Another criticized Western media reports that the Egyptian government had backed out of a possible deal with the Brotherhood. “How are you going to deal with that?” he asked.

[..] the criticism of the international media is not surprising, but the role that the local press has played as an abettor in this is the more dispiriting phenomenon.
[..]
Fatima El-Issawi, a former correspondent for Agence France Presse in Iraq [..], says one problem that can’t be overlooked is how little the media evolved during the Morsi era.
So, is Egypt moving back to the Mubarak era? Shadi Hamid, in several tweets, thinks it's even worse.

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