Media collectives in Argentina expose truth
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US army major refuses order
to seize Iraq TV station

By Charlie Thomas

May 12 (AGR)— An American officer was removed from command in Iraq after courageously disobeying orders to seize a TV station.

The only TV station in Mosul, an Iraqi city of two million people, lost its cameras to looters and so turned to outside programming. The station aired programs from various Arabic news channels and from NBC. When it televised some programs from al-Jazeera, however, the commander of the 101st Airborne Division, Maj. Gen. David Petraeus ordered his troops to seize the station.

The US has criticized al-Jazeera, based in Qatar, as being biased against the US because it broadcast footage of civilian casualties from American bombs.

Major Charmaine Means, the head of the Army public affairs office in Mosul, said that she could not agree to the seizure, saying that to do so would mean that the station would be intimidated into airing only material approved by the US military.

What happened next was reported by Yochi J. Dreazen in the Wall Street Journal: “Maj. Means was told to pick up a nearby telephone. On the other end, Col. Thomas Schoenback, chief of staff of the division, ordered her to go along with Gen. Petraeus’s plan to take the station, according to people familiar with the matter. When she again refused, he relieved her of her duties. A short time later, she was told that she would be flown out of Mosul on an Army helicopter...”

The Wall Street Journal story noted that the decision to take over the station has not been reported in Mosul, which has no newspaper or radio station.

The refusal of any officer in any army to obey a command is an extremely rare event. It was an uncommon act of great courage, and yet Maj. Means’ refusal was reported only in a small story on page 4A of the Journal. There was no report of the event in the Washington Post, the New York Times, the Associated Press, or anywhere else. An internet search for Maj. Charmaine Means turned up only the March, 2003 listing by the Department of the Army of her promotion to major. A day after the Journal story ran, the Washington Post reported that the US was “considering” taking over the station, and made no mention of Maj. Means’ refusal to carry out her orders or her removal from command. Maj. Means’ action could well result in a court martial, and will almost certainly end her Army career. Her courage in resisting an illegal order would undoubtedly be cause for great commendation from those who favor freedom of speech if the incident were widely reported.

That an important story like this went virtually unreported shows the importance that the military places on controlling the media in Iraq and, and the same time, hiding that control.

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Media collectives in Argentina expose truth

By Marie Trigona

Buenos Aires, Argentina, May 11— Along this city’s major downtown avenues in December, 4,000 copies of a poster depicted a police officer clubbing an unarmed protester under the words, “The only insecurity is repression.” The images appeared on the first anniversary of demonstrations, looting and police violence that brought down President Fernando de la Rúa’s government and killed 33 people.

The poster is the work of Argentina Burns, one of several alternative media collectives that have taken root in Buenos Aires over the last year. The groups are building democratic communication models and lifting voices excluded from mass media.

Formed in January 2002, Argentina Burns reports on protests, grassroots organizing and government repression. The group produces journalistic reports, photos and videos, publishes a Web site and a monthly newspaper, and exhibits work at rallies and street protests. The two-dozen active participants include artists, students, teachers, long-time activists, professional journalists and internationals. They operate without a permanent office and hold biweekly meetings in a café run by the human rights group Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo. Their funding comes from selling newspapers, videos and photos.

Another collective, the Independent Media Center-Argentina (IMC-Argentina), formed in November 2001 just before the protests. With 20 core participants, mostly young Buenos Aires natives, IMC-Argentina facilitates journalistic reports, videos, radio segments and photographs, mostly through its web site. IMC-Argentina receives most of its funding from the global IndyMedia network, which relies on donations.

The power of alternative media was evident after a June 26, 2002 march by unemployed Argentines and supporters in Buenos Aires. Leading up to the event, the corporate media publicized accusations that the piqueteros, as the unemployed protesters are known, are extremist, subversive and violent. The hype accompanied government threats to repress the protesters’ planned blockade of a busy bridge.

Despite the threats, 5,000 protesters showed up for the blockade. Police violently dispersed them, killing two -- Darío Santillán, 21, and Maximiliano Kosteki, 22 -- and wounding more than 100.

Police Commissioner Alfredo Fanchiotti and other officials initially denied responsibility for the killings. National Security Secretary Juan José Alvarez claimed the piqueteros had been planning an armed struggle. Many journalists insinuated the piqueteros were armed and that their intentions were violent. Media magnate Daniel Hadad said on his Radio 10 show that the piqueteros provoked the police.

The day of the killings, IMC-Argentina published the only accurate reports, detailing how the police divided the marchers into two columns and indiscriminately attacked them, throwing tear gas canisters and shooting bullets made of both rubber and lead. Página 12, Argentina’s most progressive mainstream daily, followed with similar witness accounts and photos by independent journalist Sergio Kobalebsky, showing that the slain protesters were shot in a train station 10 blocks from the protest, that police shot Santillán while he was kneeling to help an already wounded Kosteki, and that Santillán pleaded for his life before the officers shot him several times. The photos showed Fanchiotti himself dragging and dumping Santillán outside the station. Clarín, the nation’s largest daily, finally republished the images June 28, sparking nationwide outrage and homicide charges against Fanchiotti and his driver.

The need for democratic media is increasing as Argentina’s crisis deepens and as neighborhood assemblies, worker-controlled factories and the piqueteros pick up steam.

“Most movements don’t have media access to publicize their visions, proposals and reality,” notes IMC-Argentina photographer Manuel Palazios, 24. “We say each person is a correspondent. We enable everyone to produce news.”

Source: Weekly News Update on the Americas

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