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Al Jazeera English was named News Channel of the Year at the Royal Television Society (RTS) Awards in London on Wednesday ahead of competition from Sky News and BBC News. The five-year old channel, based in Qatar, received praise for its coverage of the Arab Awakening, Egypt’s Tahrir Square protests, and for being the first on the scene to report the death of former Libyan dictator, Muammar Gaddafi.

“Al Jazeera English has had the most incredible year: a year where people took to the streets in protest, the economic crisis unfolded across Europe, and the world witnessed the devastating impact of the tsunami in Japan. Al Jazeera English was there to capture every moment, and it is a great privilege for our reporters and bureaus across the world to receive this award in recognition of our hard work,” said Al Anstey, managing director, Al Jazeera English. “We look forward to continue providing in-depth, award-winning coverage as Al Jazeera English grows in reach and popularity across the world.”

In addition, the Innovative News Award was given to an Al Jazeera English programme called The Stream. An analysis of the struggle between government loyalists and opposition supporters in Bahrain, the documentary draws heavily on social media and Skype interviews.

“The Stream allowed people to share their experiences and air their views in the midst of government crackdowns across the Middle East. The Stream was created for this very purpose, because we acknowledged the power of social media and citizen journalism and wanted to harness it. We share this award with everyone that has contributed to the show and its success,” said Paul Eedle, director of programmes, Al Jazeera English.

(Source: Asia-Pacific Broadcasting Union)

In a bid to pull the ailing Radio Pakistan out of a deep financial crunch, a National Assembly standing committee has approved recommendations by the Pakistan Broadcasting Corporation (PBC) to collect 2% tax on every recharge from cellular phone users and a one-time fee on the purchase of new vehicles.

• Read the story from the Express Tribune

Pub landlady Karen Murphy has today finally won her battle with the English Premier League over the use of a foreign TV decoder to screen games. For six years she has been fighting for permission to show matches in the Red, White and Blue pub, in Fawcett Road, Southsea, while bypassing the hefty fees demanded by Sky.

Now the High Court in London has quashed the conviction she received in 2006, when she was prosecuted for breaching copyright law when she decided to use a broadcaster not authorised by the League, Greek channel Nova. It follows a historic victory in the European Court of Justice which ruled that an exclusive system of licences for the broadcasting of football matches in different EU countries is ‘contrary to EU law’.

But the judge in the case made clear that many other complex issues regarding the wider legality of screening matches would have to be decided ‘at a later date’.

(Source: portsmouth.co.uk)

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The Netherlands and the United States have agreed to intensify their cooperation in the fight against cyber crime. Justice Minister Ivo Opstelten signed a treaty to that effect on Wednesday evening in Washington DC. In an interview on Dutch public radio, the minister said that the treaty did not include paragraphs on the protection of privacy.

• Read more from RNW News

“Iranian hackers” attacked the websites of the Azerbaijan State Television & Radio Company, AzTV, and Azerbaijani Airlines (AZAL) on 22-23 February. A message in English from the hackers popped up in place of the AzTV website when it was opened.

The website has already been restored. Hackers posted a different message in English on the AZAL website - “Hacked By Cocain Warriors from persia” (sic). AZAL spokesman Maharram Safarli told APA that company was working to restore the website.

In January Iranian hackers attacked a number of Azerbaijani websites, including the website of the ruling Yeni Azerbaijan Party, the post office Azermarka, APA news agency and a number of ministries and state structures. In response, Azerbaijani hackers hacked dozens of Iranian websites.

Relations between the two countries are tense at present. Iran has accused Baku of helping Israeli security agencies kill an Iranian nuclear physicist, but Baku denies the allegations. In turn, Baku says it has smashed terrorist groups in Azerbaijan which had links with Tehran and were planning to assassinate foreigners.

Notes of protest have been exchanged,

(Source: News.Az)

Andy Sennitt comments: This doesn’t look like an attack that was officially sanctioned by the Iranian Government. As the screenshot above shows, they can’t even spell ‘Iranian’ properly. Furthermore, I don’t believe an official Iranian source would refer to the country as ‘Persia’. This has all the hallmarks of mischief-makers outside Iran, taking advantage of the tense situation between the two countries.

Reporters Without Borders says it “very firmly condemns” the semi-state owned company Kyrgyztelecom’s blocking of access to the website of Ferghana, an independent news agency that covers central Asia. The press freedom organisation describes the situation as a “major step backwards”.

Kyrgyztelecom chairman Askar Baratbayev announced yesterday that his telecommunications company has blocked access to the Ferghana site in response to a formal request from the Kyrgyz state communications agency. The Kyrgyz parliament adopted a resolution to this effect last June, but it had not been carried out until now.

“We are shocked,” Reporters Without Borders said. “After months of silence, we had hoped that Kyrgyzstan’s parliamentarians had realized the enormity of their resolution and decided not to apply it. Blocking a news website that is as professional and impartial as Ferghana’s is a major step backwards for a country that aspires to be ’Central Asia’s first parliamentary democracy’. We reiterate our appeal to the entire Kyrgyz political class, on which the democratic hopes of the April 2010 uprising are pinned, to end this absurd and outrageous situation.”

In a resolution made public on 16 June 2011, the Kyrgyz parliament called for access to Ferghana to be blocked on the grounds that its coverage of violence in southern Kyrgyzstan in June 2010 had been “subjective” and “provocative.”

Reporters Without Borders had described the news agency’s coverage as “exemplary”. However, Ferghana was criticized by some political tendencies for frequently raising questions about the future of Kyrgyz democracy and the rise of nationalism in the country.

(Source: Reporters Without Borders)

Tunisia’s court of cassation on today threw out a ruling banning pornographic websites, a judicial source and a press freedom watchdog said. “The court quashed the first instance and appeals ruling that ordered the censorship of pornographic websites,” the judicial source told AFP on condition of anonymity. The source added the case would go back to an appeals court.

“This is rather good news,” said Olivia Gre, whose organisation Reporters Without Borders had warned against returning to the censorship that prevailed in pre-revolution Tunisia, under the ousted regime of Zine el Abidine Ben Ali.

“I respect the court’s decision but I think the judiciary has shirked the issue. We will use the same arguments to win this case in the appeals court,” lawyer Monaem Turki, one of the plaintiffs, said. He had said earlier this month that pornographic websites offended Muslim values and should not be accessible from Tunisia. “In France, Hitler apologist websites are censored. Likewise, in Tunisia, there should also be prohibitions and pornographic sites are not tolerable,” Turki said.

But rights groups and the internet agency (ATI) itself, which was already ordered twice to filter porn sites, have spoken out against censorship. “It’s a step backwards,” ATI’s chief executive Moez ChakChouk had said. “Under Ben Ali, the ATI was an instrument of political control and censorship. Today we are fighting for the neutrality of the Internet, but they want to put the old cloak back on us.” He also said filtering would compromise the quality and speed of data transfers, and that his agency did not have sufficient funds to carry out such censorship anyway.

(Source: AFP)

The Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) has engaged British consultants to conduct a major review of its daily TV, radio and online newsgathering operation. The director of ABC news, Kate Torney, said British news experts Gary Rogers and Gay Flashman from Venture Consulting had vast experience at the BBC, ITN and Sky and would spend time with staff in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Perth to “get a sense of the workflow in various newsrooms and the different demands and pressures”.

• Read the story from The Australian

The European Commission said today it has asked the EU’s highest court to rule on the legality of a controversial treaty covering copyright, counterfeiting and Internet freedom. The EU executive “decided today to ask the European Court of Justice for a legal opinion to clarify that the ACTA agreement and its implementation must be fully compatible with freedom of expression and freedom of the internet,” said a statement.

The United States, Japan and Canada are also among signatories, but a number of mainly eastern European states have threatened not to ratify the treaty, which critics say could curtail Internet freedom. The Commission has defended ACTA against accusations that it amounts to a witch hunt against individuals illegally downloading content and has vowed to try to keep the deal alive when it comes up for ratification later this month by the European Parliament.

“Let me be very clear: I share people’s concern for these fundamental freedoms… especially over the freedom of the Internet,” EU trade commissioner Karel De Gucht told a news conference in announcing the decision. “This debate must be based upon facts, and not upon the misinformation and rumour that has dominated social media sites and blogs in recent weeks,” he added. He said the agreement “aims to raise global standards for intellectual property rights” and said ACTA “will help protect jobs currently lost because counterfeited, pirated good worth 200 billion euros are currently floating around.”

However, there appeared to be differences of view even within the Commission. Viviane Reding, the EU’s commissioner for justice, fundamental rights and citizenship had shortly earlier flagged up on Twitter a statement of her own in which she said “copyright protection can never be a justification for eliminating freedom of expression or freedom of information.” She underlined: “That is why for me, blocking the Internet is never an option.”

Twenty-two of the 27 EU states signed the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) on 26 January in Tokyo. Since then, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Romania have said they will not ratify the pact. Slovenia’s newly-appointed government also said last week it was considering freezing its ratification of the accord signed by the previous government in January.

European Parliament president Martin Schulz has called the pact “unbalanced” and difficult to accept in its current form, and Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) media freedom representative Dunja Mijatovic last week it could undermine freedom of expression. An EU negotiator said a rejection by one EU state or parliament could bury the whole project.

(Source: AFP)

Related stories:

• Europeans protest controversial Internet pact
• Bulgaria drops online piracy treaty after protest

Improving presentation qualities of Doordarshan and All India Radio and filling up of key vacancies are the top priorities of new Prasar Bharati CEO Jawhar Sircar, who assumed office today. Sircar, who was Secretary, Ministry of Culture, before joining the Prasar Bharati, spoke about his priorities while interacting with reporters.

He said though the news content and reach of Doordarshan and AIR were remarkable, the presentation standards were not up to the mark. “Presentation is an area where we need to give attention ….,” he said, adding, “We are high on content and could improve upon presentation of content.” Sircar said he needed time to understand why presentation was not up to competitive standards.

(Source: PTI)

When professor Qian Nairong published his dictionary of the Shanghai dialect in 2007, he was in some ways documenting a dying language. The number of people speaking the rapid-fire language - a badge of identity for residents of China’s commercial capital of more than 20 million people - is shrinking.

As the government maintains a decades-old drive to promote Mandarin Chinese as the official language, banning dialects from media broadcasts and schools, many young people are unable to fluently speak the native Shanghai tongue. An influx of migrants from outside Shanghai and the city’s drive to become more international have also combined to water down the local patois.

In the 1990s, the local government pulled radio and television broadcasts using the Shanghai dialect as part of a national campaign. A popular Shanghai radio show “A Fu Gen” which featured discussions of current events was among the victims. Xiao Ling, a host for the show, struggled for 10 years before a sympathetic official revived the programme.

Xiao is one of only two hosts at the radio station who have formal broadcast training in the Shanghai dialect. Last year, the programme was forced to hold open auditions to find candidates with Shanghai language skills to fill open positions. “My colleagues joke that we are giant pandas,” said Xiao.

Shanghai is not alone. China’s southern province of Guangdong has announced plans requiring broadcasters to get special permission to use the Cantonese dialect in programmes from 1 March, causing a storm of controversy.

(Source: ANP)

Andy Sennitt adds: I recall that in the 1970s, Radio Station Peace and Progress from Moscow had daily programmes in the Shanghai and Canton dialects in addition to Mandarin. These are listed in, amongst others, WRTH 1978.

Dutch internet piracy watchdog Brein has forced 600 piracy sites to go offline in 2011. The foundation called the blockade of The Pirate Bay site by two ISPs an important result of its work of the past few years.

• Read the story from RNW News

New Zealand’s foreign minister says it is entirely appropriate for the ministry of foreign affairs to advise TVNZ to withhold feeds from Fiji’s state broadcaster. The FBC says it has had two requests to get TVNZ’s free Pacific service turned down on instructions from New Zealand’s ministry of foreign affairs.

Murray McCully says supplying the programming would amount to government to government support, which would go against sanctions that have been in place since the 2006 coup.

“If state-owned enterprises in New Zealand are asked to supply something to a Pacific neighbour, I’m sure that in most cases they’d want to assist. But where that Pacific neighbour is the subject of government sanctions, for reasons that I think are highly regrettable, I think it’s entirely appropriate that they ask the Ministry of Foreign Affairs how this would look in relation to the sanctions.”

Murray McCully says this is not the only request for assistance that has been declined.

(Source: Radio New Zealand International)

Related story:

• NZ refuses to allow TVNZ news on FBC TV

Internet giant Yahoo! today applied to be removed from a lawsuit lodged in an Indian court against social networking sites hosting allegedly offensive content. More than 20 Internet firms, including Google and Facebook, have been named in the case, which follows meetings between government ministers and the companies over material seen as offending Muslims or defaming politicians.

Yahoo! was made part of the lawsuit “on the patently mistaken assumption that it is a social networking website”, lawyers for the company said in a district court hearing in Delhi. The lawyers added there was “no cause of action” against Yahoo!, and described the case, which has been brought by a member of the public, as “a complete abuse of the process of law”.

Telecoms Minister Kapil Sibal has pressurised global Internet firms to crack down on offensive material but he has denied accusations of censorship, saying they only had to obey the same rules governing the press. Google and Facebook said earlier this month that they had removed allegedly offensive content used as evidence in court.

The groups have appealed to the Delhi High Court asking for cases against them to be quashed on the basis they cannot be held responsible for their clients’ actions.

(Source: AFP)

Employees of Libya’s state-run radio network are about to complete their training at a Turkish university as they countdown to launch their broadcast soon. Seven employees with the Libyan National Radio are set to go on air on 1 March in the Libyan city of Tajura after finishing their training at Turkey’s Suleyman Demirel University with the support of Turkey’s International Development and Cooperation Agency, or TIKA.

“People of Tajura love Turkey and Turkish people. Our broadcast will include programmes on Turkish music and culture. I believe our radio will make a major contribution to our country’s economic development and democratization,” Nouri Suleiman Zawiya, a Libyan radio employee, told the Anatolia Agency.

(Source: Asia-Pacific Broadcasting Union)