Bush backed by Clear Channel
Clear Channel (CC) says its radio network does not have a political agenda, but new political contribution data tell a different story about Clear Channel executives. They have given $42,200 to Bush in the 2004 race and CC’s political action committee gave 77percent of their $334,501 in federal contributions to Republicans. CC CEO Lowry Mays and his sons led the campaign giving. Mays gave $12,500 to the Republican National Committee in September. He gave $2,000 to Bush in July. President Mark Mays and Chief Financial Officer Randall Mays each gave $2,000 to Bush last year, as well.

Critics worry that CC’s airwave dominance will stifle diversity of broadcast views as the FCC, Congress, and the courts debate restricting radio ownership. “When they are that powerful and they have a political track record, it can make one uneasy,” says Andrew Schwartzman, president of Media Access Project, a watchdog group. (USA Today)

US bans Iraqi Shi’ite newspaper
Iraq’s US-led administration on Mar. 28 shut down a newspaper that is a mouthpiece for radical Shi’ite cleric Moqtada Sadr, accusing it of publishing articles that incite violence against US troops. Ali Yasseri, editor of the weekly al-Hawza newspaper, said dozens of US troops padlocked the newspaper’s offices after ordering staff to leave. “They told us they would arrest us if we did not leave. They said our articles incite people against America,” Yasseri told Reuters outside the newspaper offices. US soldiers handed him a letter from US civil administrator Paul Bremer, citing a breach of an order issued last year that bans incitement to violence. The letter referred to a series of articles it said had incited hatred, including an editorial entitled “Bremer follows the steps of Saddam.” “This is a violation of our rights,” Yasseri said.

Last July, the US-led administration closed down another newspaper for inciting violence. The Arabic-language satellite television news channels Al Jazeera and Al Arabiya have also faced sanctions from the administration and the Iraqi Governing Council for allegedly violating the law. (BBC)

Iraqi outcry as US bans Shia newspaper
Hundreds of Iraqis have protested in Baghdad after a Shia newspaper was banned for allegedly inciting violence against the US-led coalition. Angry crowds gathered at the offices of Al-Hawza Al-Natiqa weekly, which is produced by supporters of the radical Shia cleric Moqtada Sadr. US troops earlier delivered a letter announcing a 60-day ban on the weekly. Demonstrators responded by chanting anti-US slogans and burnt a US flag in Baghdad’s al-Hurriyah square. A spokesman for Sadr said the paper was against the US occupation of Iraq, but denied the charge that it incited violence.

Sadr, a young cleric based in the holy city of Najaf, has fast risen to prominence since the US-led invasion in 2003. Huge crowds flock to his fiery sermons calling for an end to the US occupation of Iraq, while his supporters have formed an armed militia claiming to provide security and social welfare for Shias. Recent articles in Al-Hawza have accused the chief US administrator, Paul Bremer, of following in the footsteps of the deposed dictator, Saddam Hussein, by persecuting Shias. The publication has also alleged US rockets -- rather than a car-bomb, as was widely reported -- killed 53 Iraqis in the town of Iskandariyah recently. (BBC)

Army justifies civilian death
A US soldier who killed Reuters cameraman Mazen Dana in Iraq was justified in opening fire, a US army report said on Mar. 22. The report, made public seven months after Dana died, found that the soldier’s “decision to fire at Dana was justified based on the information available to him at the time.” Reuters said it could not agree that the death of Dana, a prize-winning Palestinian cameraman, was justified and called for the urgent implementation of recommendations in the report to improve the safety of journalists in war zones.

The Army report said the soldier, who shot from a tank, had a “reasonable certainty” that Dana was about to fire a rocket- propelled grenade, having mistaken his camera for a launcher. But it said the tank commander recognized Dana was holding a camera immediately after the fatal shots were fired. (Reuters)