The Channel | 2004 | September

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16 | the channel
Doha-based television broadcaster and AIB
Platinummember Aljazeera hosted a two day
conference in Qatar’s capital on 12 and 13
July to discuss the challenges facing the
media in the Arab world and to help explain
Aljazeera’s mission and operating ethos.
Attended by delegates from the worlds of
print, broadcasting and academia in the
Middle East and beyond, the event was
designed to debate the relationship between
Arabic broadcasters and their audiences, and
the relationships between western and Arab
media. Representing broadcasters at the
conference – international and domestic –
were Abu Dhabi TV, ARD, BBC News, CBC
News, Deutsche Welle, Fox News, LBC
(Lebanon), NHK, Radio Netherlands, TV
Asahi, Sky News (UK), Swiss TV and VRT.
In his opening address Aljazeera’s managing
director, Waddah Khanfar, said that he hoped
that the world’s media would find common
ground to establish a unified code of
journalistic ethics, based on the premise that
“we are members of the same profession”.
However, said chairman of Aljazeera’s board
Sheikh Hamad bin Thamer Al Thani, in
practise this is extremely difficult, if not
impossible, to achieve.
It was clear from the initial session that divisions
and prejudices in the Middle East remain
immense obstacles to objectivity and
impartiality and therefore the promotion of civil
society and democracy in the region. For
example the chair of the initial session, Hamdi
Qandil - an Arab broadcast journalist - said that
he was upset that Israelis appear on Aljazeera’s
output, qualifying this by saying that this is
because of his ethnic background and his beliefs.
However, said Qandil, it is important not to
throw stones [like this] as everyone lives in a
glass house. The debate in this first session was
fiery. Eric Wishart, editor-in-chief at AFP, said
that he did not think it is possible to have an
agreed international journalistic code of ethics
as there are too many views. You would never
get the British, the Americans, the Chinese and
the Arabs to agree to a single code.
However it must be recognised that “with
coverage of war comes lots of responsibility”.
For example, the Internet raises daily
questions of credibility – if you use the
Internet as a source, is it reliable? Bertrand
Picquerie, director of the World Association
of Newspapers, observed that Aljazeera is a
baby in world media terms and should not be
blamed for “unbalanced reporting”. “It’s a
channel that wants to be mainstream yet at
the same time be different,” said Picquerie.
“It wants to be like the BBC and CNN, yet
be different. It cannot be both.” Picquerie
suggested that there is a unique way to solve
this, by having a tripartite position that links
professionalism with cultural diversity and
strong ethics. With 35 million plus viewers,
Aljazeera should try to give a voice and a level
of what Picquerie described as “self-belief”
to those people. The Arab world is in a
democracy-building process, and Aljazeera’s
role should be to show the people how they
are part of the process. The history of the
media is entwined with the making of
democracies and today this is just as true in
the Arab world.
Delegates quickly leapt to the channel’s
defence, saying that it had achieved much
in a short period of time. Mahmoud
Shamman, a correspondent for Newsweek,
asked why the “great empire of western
democracy and media is not big enough to
accept a voice like Aljazeera coming from
the Arab world?” Delinda Hanley of the pro-
Arab Washington Report said that she did
not understand how anyone can cite
Aljazeera as being unbalanced in view of
the American media’s often highly partisan
output.
Picquerie called on Aljazeera to build
bridges with other Arab media, in particular
its biggest competitor, Al Arabiya. This
should be the channel’s priority, rather than
building links with western media, he
suggested. However, it is difficult to build
bridges in the region, said Mohammed
Krechen, a senior news presenter at
Aljazeera. The emergence of regional
satellite news channels had generated
hostility from governments in the Middle
East, such as those of Saudi Arabia and
Tunisia, while some others had reluctantly
agreed to let the channel in. The channel’s
success had also spurred on the development
of competitors backed by governments in the
Aljazeera - powering ahead with
world forum and ethics code
Khanfar: Let’s find common ground
Simon Spanswick reports from Doha where Aljazeera is building for the future, with
major intellectual investment in ethics and infrastructure in its broadcasting centre
the channel - supported by