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Category: Journalism/Media

Russia bans news outlet Bellingcat, labels it a security threat

Russia bans news outlet Bellingcat, labels it a security threat

Reuters reports: Russia on Friday banned investigative news outlet Bellingcat and its main local partner from operating inside the country, branding them security threats. Netherlands-based Bellingcat exposed the Russian-backed soldiers behind the downing of Malaysian Airlines jet MH17 over eastern Ukraine in 2014 and unmasked FSB agents sent to poison Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny in 2020. Russia’s Prosecutor General said the activities of Bellingcat its partner The Insider “posed a threat to… the security of the Russian federation.” Both will…

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As trust wanes, conspiracy theories rise

As trust wanes, conspiracy theories rise

The Associated Press reports: The global public relations firm Edelman has conducted surveys about public trust for more than two decades, beginning after the 1999 World Trade Organization’s meeting in Seattle was marred by anti-globalization riots. Tonia Reis, director of Edelman’s Trust Barometer surveys, said trust is a precious commodity that’s vital for the economy and government to function. “Trust is absolutely essential to everything in society working well,” Reis said. “It’s one of those things that, like air, people…

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Fox and other rightwing networks confront billion-dollar lawsuits over election fraud claims

Fox and other rightwing networks confront billion-dollar lawsuits over election fraud claims

The Guardian reports: In the months following the 2020 US presidential election, rightwing TV news in America was a wild west, an apparently lawless free-for-all where conspiracy theories about voting machines, ballot-stuffed suitcases and dead Venezuelan leaders were repeated to viewers around the clock. There seemed to be little consequence for peddling the most outrageous ideas on primetime. But now, unfortunately for Fox News, One America News Network (OAN), and Newsmax, it turns out that this brave, new world wasn’t…

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Reporters Without Borders investigation indicates Mark Levin and his bodyguard were executed by Russian soldiers

Reporters Without Borders investigation indicates Mark Levin and his bodyguard were executed by Russian soldiers

Reporters Without Borders: RSF sent two investigators to collect evidence and search for clues from 24 May to 3 June: Arnaud Froger, the head of RSF’s investigation desk, and Patrick Chauvel, a French war photo-reporter who had worked with Levin in the Donbas at the end of February. They concluded that Levin and Chernyshov were executed in cold blood. The evidence against the Russian forces is overwhelming. It is detailed in a report published today entitled How Ukrainian journalist Maks…

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How reporters can cover and distinguish threats to democracy from politics-as-usual

How reporters can cover and distinguish threats to democracy from politics-as-usual

Protect Democracy: Authoritarianism rarely happens overnight these days. Today’s authoritarian playbook is a process that happens piecemeal and is hard to distinguish from normal political jockeying. Our report, The Authoritarian Playbook: How reporters can contextualize and cover authoritarian threats as distinct from politics-as-usual outlines the seven fundamental tactics used by aspiring authoritarians, describes examples from in and outside the United States, and offers a framework journalists can use to differentiate between politics-as-usual and something more dangerous to democracy. The vigilance…

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Group aiming to defund disinformation tries to drain Fox News of online advertising

Group aiming to defund disinformation tries to drain Fox News of online advertising

NPR reports: A nonprofit aiming to defund disinformation online that has taken money out of the pockets of several prominent far-right websites now has its sights set on its most formidable target yet: Fox News. The group, Check My Ads, is hoping the success it has had in stripping advertising dollars from right-wing provocateurs including Steve Bannon, Glenn Beck and Dan Bongino will give it momentum as it attempts to confront a powerful media empire. On Thursday, the outfit announced…

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India’s war on journalists

India’s war on journalists

Zeba Warsi writes: An unsettling, eerie silence engulfed the streets of Khajuri Khas two days after the riots. The neighborhood is a Muslim ghetto and was one of the worst hit in the anti-Muslim violence that erupted in Delhi in late February 2020. Fifty-three people were killed, a majority of them Muslims. I walked through lanes covered in ashes. The air was thick with the toxic smell of burned refrigerators and charred vehicles. Broken pieces of furniture lined the streets….

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New evidence suggests Al Jazeera journalist was killed in targeted attack by Israeli forces

New evidence suggests Al Jazeera journalist was killed in targeted attack by Israeli forces

CNN reports: Several shots ring out in quick succession, cutting through a clear, blue spring morning in Jenin, in the West Bank. Crack, crack, crack, crack, crack, crack, crack. The cameraman filming the scene scrambles backwards to take cover behind a low concrete wall. Then a man cries out in Arabic: “Injured! Shireen, Shireen, oh man, Shireen! Ambulance!” When the camera operator pans around the corner, Al Jazeera journalist Shireen Abu Akleh can be seen lying motionless, face down on…

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The Kyiv Independent responds to appeasement promoted by the New York Times

The Kyiv Independent responds to appeasement promoted by the New York Times

In an editorial, The Kyiv Independent says: The New York Times editorial, “The War in Ukraine Is Getting Complicated, and America Isn’t Ready,” published on May 19, immediately caused an uproar in Ukraine. A veiled manifesto of appeasement from a newspaper known for its stellar coverage of Russia’s horrific invasion has disappointed many. In the editorial, the New York Times editorial board argues that it’s too dangerous to assume that Ukraine can win the war. It says “Russia is too…

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The pro-Russian attempt to link the Buffalo shooting to Ukraine

The pro-Russian attempt to link the Buffalo shooting to Ukraine

Chris York reports: Ten people lay dead and a teenager armed with an assault rifle and a written tirade promoting white supremacy had been arrested. Yet just hours after the horrific mass shooting in Buffalo, New York, a small corner of the internet was trying to pin the blame nearly 5,000 miles away, in Ukraine. The link was tenuous at best: A photo of the shooter, 18-year-old Payton Gendron, shows him wearing clothing emblazoned with a “sonnenrad,” a neo–Nazi symbol…

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Why is Glenn Greenwald defending Tucker Carlson and the ‘great replacement’?

Why is Glenn Greenwald defending Tucker Carlson and the ‘great replacement’?

Eoin Higgins writes: Greenwald has been a Fox News partisan for some time, in near-perfect correlation to how often he’s invited on the network. Carlson has hosted Greenwald numerous times, while gaining his unswerving loyalty. What this loyalty has meant in real terms is relentless pro-Carlson arguments from Greenwald. He has seldom criticized Carlson or Fox News — as I detailed last year — and his deference has paid off with a near-weekly slot appearing on Carlson’s primetime show. (Greenwald…

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Viktor Orbán tells CPAC the path to power is to ‘have your own media’

Viktor Orbán tells CPAC the path to power is to ‘have your own media’

The Guardian reports: The Hungarian leader, Viktor Orbán, has told a conference of US conservatives that the path to power required having their own media outlets, calling for shows like Tucker Carlson’s to be broadcast “24/7”. Orbán, recently elected to a fourth term, laid out a 12-point blueprint to achieving and consolidating power to a special meeting of the US Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), under the slogan of “God, Homeland, Family”, held in Budapest. The Hungarian prime minister said…

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Israeli military commander justifies killing journalists who are ‘armed with cameras’

Israeli military commander justifies killing journalists who are ‘armed with cameras’

The Washington Post reports: The death this week of Palestinian American journalist Shireen Abu Akleh — who was shot dead during an Israeli raid in the West Bank city of Jenin — has highlighted the dangers reporters face while covering the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Abu Akleh, a veteran correspondent who worked for the Al Jazeera news network, was wearing protective gear and a vest marked “press” as she covered the morning raid Wednesday. Such gear is standard and meant to distinguish…

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If Fox News’ owner was Russian, there would be no hesitation in applying sanctions

If Fox News’ owner was Russian, there would be no hesitation in applying sanctions

Nick Cohen writes: If the west could find the courage, it would order an immediate freeze of Rupert Murdoch’s assets. His Fox News presenters and Russia’s propagandists are so intermeshed that separating the two is as impossible as unbaking a cake. On Russian state news, as on Fox, bawling ideologues scream threats then whine about their victimhood as they incite anger and self-pity in equal measures. Its arguments range from the appropriation of anti-fascism by Greater Russian imperialists – the…

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American nationalist: How Tucker Carlson stoked white fear to conquer cable news

American nationalist: How Tucker Carlson stoked white fear to conquer cable news

Nicholas Confessore writes: Tucker Carlson burst through the doors of Charlie Palmer Steak, enfolded in an entourage of producers and assistants, cellphone pressed to his ear. On the other end was Lachlan Murdoch, chairman of the Fox empire and his de facto boss. Most of Fox’s Washington bureau, along with the cable network’s top executives, had gathered at the power-class steakhouse, a few blocks from the office, for their annual holiday party. Days earlier, Mr. Carlson had set off an…

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Changes at CNN and New York Times signal less advocacy, more journalism

Changes at CNN and New York Times signal less advocacy, more journalism

The Guardian reports: The highest echelons of the US media were once again in the spotlight this week, after CNN this week abandoned a newly launched streaming service and the New York Times appointed a prominent Bostonian to lead it. CNN+ will shut down on 30 April, about a month after it was launched with a $300m investment. The new owner of the network, Warner Bros Discovery – itself the product of a $43bn merger between AT&T and the Discovery…

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