September 10, 2005

US drops plans to bar CNN from reporting on recovery of dead

Link: CNN.com - U.S. drops�banning media�from body hunt - Sep 10, 2005.

Rather than fight a lawsuit by CNN, the federal government abandoned its effort Saturday to prevent the media from reporting on the recovery of the dead in New Orleans.

Joint Task Force Katrina "has no plans to bar, impede or prevent news media from their news gathering and reporting activities in connection with the deceased Hurricane Katrina victim recovery efforts," said Col. Christian E. deGraff, representing the task force.

U.S. District Court Judge Keith Ellison issued a temporary restraining order Friday against a "zero access" policy announced earlier in the day by Army Lt. Gen. Russel Honore, who is overseeing the federal relief effort in the city, and Terry Ebbert, the city's homeland security director.

In explaining the ban, Ebbert said, "we don't think that's proper" to let members of the media view the bodies.

The judge was to consider granting a permanent injunction Saturday when the government announced its decision not to fight CNN's lawsuit.

In an e-mail to CNN staff, CNN News Group President Jim Walton said the network filed the the lawsuit to "prohibit any agency from restricting its ability to fully and fairly cover" the hurricane victim recovery process.

"As seen most recently from war zones in Afghanistan and Iraq, from tsunami-ravaged South Asia and from Hurricane Katrina's landfall along the Gulf," Walton wrote, "CNN has shown that it is capable of balancing vigorous reporting with respect for private concerns."

I was in India when the tsunami hit. There the government made no effort to control media coverage of the disaster and the deathtoll. The shocking part is that the American government's earlier announced policy of barring media access was enunciated by the task force charged with disaster recovery. Shouldn't they be trying to rescue people and recover bodies rather than trying to rescue Bush and recover the Republican Party's national standing?

Posted by Anupam Chander on September 10, 2005 at 08:18 AM in Current Affairs | Permalink