US media irresponsibility?

SAN FRANCISCO – One of the hottest news stories now all over US television and print media is about a Newsweek Magazine report which stated that US interrogators had desecrated the Koran while attempting to extract intelligence information from Muslim prisoners at the Guantanamo Bay detention facility.

In its May 9th issue, Newsweek claimed that a "longtime reliable source, a senior US government official," confirmed that military interrogators had flushed a Koran down the toilet in an attempt to rattle suspects. The report led to violent anti-American protests in Afghanistan which resulted in at least 14 people killed and more than a hundred injured. Demonstrations also broke out in Pakistan and other Muslim countries.

Subsequently, though, Newsweek admitted that its source "backed away" from his earlier assertion that investigators had concluded that military personnel flushed a Koran down the toilet. The magazine then apologized and expressed regret about the violence that resulted from the story.

A senior Newsweek editor acknowledged on television that that was, in effect, a retraction. However, no one in the magazine’s staff, he said, would be disciplined. Moreover, he insisted that the editors had taken unusual steps to ensure the accuracy of the article. A draft of the item had been shown to a certain US official before the publication of the issue, but the story was neither confirmed nor denied. The senior Newsweek editor said the magazine would continue to investigate the allegations about the desecration of the Koran.

Naturally, the Bush administration and the Pentagon have blasted Newsweek for this "inaccuracy," blaming the magazine for the violent protests and the resulting casualties. But although the magazine retracted the report, it has not quite engaged in public self-flagellation.

Its basic stance is that the report of the desecration of the Koran had not actually been proved to be inaccurate. Rather, its source within the US government had said he could no longer be sure that what he read in a report of the US Southern Command about alleged abuses contained a reference to flushing the Koran down the toilet.

Whatever the truth is – and it is undeniably important to establish the facts about this incident – the reaction of the Muslim world was unsurprising and totally predictable. The practices of US intelligence interrogators have been under suspicion since the revelations about the Abu Ghraib scandal. It has become quite easy, in light of those revelations and the results of on-going military trials of male and female soldiers accused of abuses, to believe that there may still be other incidents which the US military command is keeping under wraps.

Although this was not one of Newsweek’s finest journalistic hours, I do not see any widespread condemnation of the magazine other than by the usual neo-conservative hit men. Newsweek lost some public esteem here but one mistake, even one as serious as this gaffe, will not cause the magazine to lose all its hard-earned credibility.

On the other hand, unfair though it may seem because of Newsweek’s less-than-sterling performance, the US obviously has a major image problem. It’s not enough to criticize the magazine for an "inaccurate" report. The US government must establish as a matter of fact that the desecration of the Koran never took place. That, I think, was the real point of the Muslim protests. If the true facts about the "flushing" incident do not emerge, then the Muslim world has a good basis for its outrage.

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All is not lost, however. There are still clear instances of journalistic amor propio around. Aaron Brown, the anchor of CNN’s daily News Night newscast, apparently declined an award from an advocacy group for his reporting of the Terri Schiavo case. You recall the painful saga of the unsuccessful battle of Terri’s parents through the federal and state courts to save her life, after her husband decided to have her feeding tubes removed. Terri died after two weeks, not because of the withdrawal of any medical life support system but simply because of starvation.

The award was to be conferred by a group called Compassion and Choices, which advocates a peaceful and humane death for brain-damaged patients such as Terri Schiavo. Aside from Brown, the group also intended to honor two New York Times reporters, but they too declined on the ground that the newspaper’s ethics policy prevented it.

Both CNN and Brown explained that the anchor’s acceptance of the award might taint the network’s objectivity. The Times spokesperson said it was important "to protect the paper’s neutrality."

These gestures by CNN, Brown, the Times and its two reporters are indubitably admirable, particularly at a time when competition between news outfits, in countries where freedom of speech is recognized, has been criticized as being virtually cut-throat. Sometimes, in this dog-eat-dog environment, the rivalry can take the form of news organizations trumpeting the awards and honors they receive.

If these awards are given by professional journalism organizations, for excellence in reporting for instance, there are usually no objections from either the awardees or the news organizations they represent. It is an entirely different matter, however, if the award is given by an advocacy group. In such a case, the award is obviously given because the journalist’s work was seen to be supportive of the group’s objectives.

By accepting the award, the journalist could be perceived to have lost his objectivity or neutrality insofar as this advocacy group is concerned. He might then be seen to have become a spokesman for that group.

This is, of course, arguable. The advocacy group might take the position that an award from it does not render the journalist’s credibility forever suspect. Still, at a time when competitors are more than willing to find any reason to disparage a rival news outfit, it is an accusation which any journalist would rather not face. This assumes that the journalist is serious about his craft and is not simply thinking about the number of medals or trophies or plaques he can display in his office.