29 December 2014
Twelve employees of RFE/RL’s Baku bureau have been forcibly detained by Azerbaijani authorities for questioning, with more ordered to appear for questioning today or face similar detentions.
All 12 were released without charge on December 28 after being questioned for up to 12 hours in the latest crackdown against the activities of RFE/RL’s Azerbaijani Service, known locally as Radio Azadliq. Those summoned for questioning were not allowed representation by a lawyer.
Journalists with RFE/RL’s Azerbaijani Service reported Saturday that police were pursuing them individually, going directly to their homes to take them in for questioning following a raid on the service’s Baku bureau on Friday.
In a move the news bureau’s legal team called “unprecedented – even by Azeri standards,” police late in the evening on December 27 knocked on the doors of at least four bureau reporters demanding that they accompany them to the prosecutor’s office for questioning. An additional eight journalists were told to report for questioning on Monday.
“These people are being dragged to the prosecutor’s office by force and by threats,” said one of the lawyers, who asked that his name be withheld out of concerns for his personal safety. “By being summoned over the weekend, they are being denied the opportunity to have any legal defense, despite the fact that by Azeri law a witness is normally summoned by phone or official summons to enable a lawyer to be present.”
RFE/RL Editor in Chief and Co-CEO Nenad Pejic condemned the police action, and said Azeri authorities are “terrorising our staff and their families.”
In one case, a journalist’s mother answered the door and was told by police that RFE/RL’s bureau is closed and that the daughter must go with them to have “a conversation.” In addition to the journalists, the bureau’s cleaning woman was also confronted at her home by Azeri police.
The employees, who have all requested legal representation for their questioning sessions, have been told they will be taken by force to the prosecutor’s office if they do not cooperate. A lawyer for the bureau who demanded that his clients’ right to counsel be respected was threatened by Iqbal Huseynov, a senior investigator in the case, with being disbarred.
Siyavoush Novruzov, deputy executive secretary for the ruling Yeni Azerbaijan Party, commented on the raid on Friday, characterizing it as a national security issue. Speaking to the local web portal Media Forum, he said, “Every place that works for foreign intelligence and the Armenian lobby should be searched.”
In a related development, a Baku court yesterday heard and rejected the appeal of investigative reporter and RFE/RL contributor Khadija Ismayilova, who remains in prison after being sentenced on December 5 to two months’ detention on charges of inciting a colleague to attempt suicide.
22 December 2014
SES S.A.has announced that the ASTRA 2G satellite is ready for its scheduled launch on board an ILS Proton booster from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on December 28 at 03:37:49 Baikonur Time (December 27 at 22:37:49 CET and 16:37:49 EST).
Designed and manufactured by Airbus Defence and Space, ASTRA 2G is based on the highly reliable Eurostar E3000 platform. It will have a launch mass of 6 tons, a wingspan of 40m once its solar arrays are deployed in orbit, and a spacecraft power of 13kW until the end of its 15-year design life.
ASTRA 2G will be deployed in geostationary orbit at the 28.2/28.5 degrees East neighbourhood to provide next generation broadcast and broadband services in Europe, the Middle East and Africa. The spacecraft carries 62 Ku-band transponders and 4 Ka-band transponders.
ASTRA 2G will be the twenty-fourth SES satellite to be launched by ILS Proton, and the ninth Eurostar satellite in the SES fleet. Three more E3000s are currently in production for SES. The Proton booster itself will mark its 401st launch with ASTRA 2G.
A live broadcast of the launch in high definition quality will be available via Astra at the orbital position of 19.2 degrees East, channel 1.037, downlink frequency 11023.25 MHz, horizontal polarization, Symbol rate 22.0 MSym/s, FEC 5/6, service ID 5221, service name ASTRA 2G Launch.
A webcast will also be available via http://astra2g.imgondemand.com/. The video transmission of the launch of ASTRA 2G will begin approximately 30 minutes before liftoff. (Source: SES press release)
18 December 2014
A scene from “Tek Turkiye”
AIB is concerned about what appears to be a politically-motivated campaign of intimidation against journalists and media workers in Turkey.
The detention of editors and journalists over the past few days is worrying as it goes against norms of freedom of speech. It is essential that the press and media have the ability to do their work without fear of arrest. Their work- and the overall concept of, and adherence to, freedom of speech – is core to the functioning of any country that, like Turkey, aspires to be a democratic nation that respects the rule of law.
The detention of a number of staff working on the popular TV soap opera “Tek Turkiye” is also of concern to AIB. The arrest of writers and production staff – including, for example, graphic designers – on this soap opera is outrageous.
“Turkey enjoys a vibrant media market,” commented Simon Spanswick, chief executive of AIB. “This market has developed as a direct result of the freedom of expression that has existed in Turkey for many years. It is regrettable that this freedom now seems to be at risk. AIB calls for these detentions to be halted with immediate effect and for intimidation against the press and media workers to stop.”
18 December 2014
Newstag – the Stockholm-based crowd-curated news service – is opening a subsidiary in Cairo, Egypt to handle all its incoming video news content.
Newstag’s approach to sharing news through social media will bring together video news stories from professional content producers around the world, including AP, AFP and Reuters.
The six-strong Cairo-based team will be responsible for handling, verifying and tagging stories as they arrive in one central location from all over the world. The multilingual team will operate round-the-clock handling thousands of stories each week.
The multinational team is made up of editors from around the world who have chosen to be based in Cairo for their work in journalism and media. They will also provide bespoke production and post-production services in Egypt and the region as a whole.
“Cairo is booming again: Egypt is at the crossroads of East and West and there are so many talented individuals in this city. This megalopolis with its tens of millions of inhabitants is a great centre from which to understand the world in a more nuanced way. This is at the heart of Newstag’s philosophy,” says CEO and Founder, Henrik Eklund.
Chairman and Founder Camilla Dahlin-Andersson, who has had a long career in social services and academia, added: “We are taking our first steps towards serving this dynamic market and continent and this is a significant and exciting move for Newstag.”
The opening of the Cairo bureau follows a $1.3m investment into Newstag from a group of private and institutional investors. In recent months, the company’s rapidly expanded its network of commercial and content partners as it gears up to launch its application.
Newstag’s ‘mobile-first’ service will enable users to create their own personalised ‘tagstream’ – or TV Channel – sharing the stories that they care about among their social networks. In an attempt to rebalance the traditional relationships between industry stakeholders, Newstag also offers users an opportunity to have a real impact on the world around them through the tagging of brands and NGOs.
CEO and Founder, Henrik Eklund, was AP’s Director of Digital Partnerships and Distribution in Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) and Asia. Before joining AP, Henrik was the founder and CEO of Kamera – one of the world’s leading mobile and online distributors. Prior to Kamera, Eklund founded PAN Interactive, one of Europe’s leading game publishers and distributors.
Company Chairman and Founder, Camilla Dahlin-Andersson been a member of parliament and served on several boards for large institutions. She is currently completing her doctorate in Innovation Management at Stockholm School of Economics and Mälardalens University.
Image: Ahmed Photographer under Creative Commons licence
18 December 2014
AIB has released its Position Paper on C-band frequency spectrum in advance of the World Radiocommunication Conference in November 2015.
On the agenda of WRC-15 is the potential reallocation of frequency spectrum currently used by satellite services on an exclusive basis, spectrum that broadcasters around the world rely on for a multitude of services.
“AIB is concerned about the impact that changes to C-band allocations will have on our Members and the wider broadcasting industry,” said Simon Spanswick, AIB chief executive. “Broadcasters rely on C-band to provide national and regional services to viewers in some parts of the world, and to feed programmes and provide newsgathering links. Large-scale sporting events like the FIFA World Cup and the Olympics also rely on C-band to deliver feeds to broadcasting centres throughout the world. This call by the mobile industry to acquire C-band spectrum from satellite services must be resisted by national administrations.”
AIB is briefing its Members around the world and encouraging them to raise the issue with national regulators and administrations that will take part in WRC-15. The AIB Position Paper summarises the essential use made by the broadcasting industry of C-band spectrum. In addition, AIB is talking with other broadcasters – public, state and commercial – to ensure that they know of the threat to their operations.
“It is vital that as many broadcasters as possible raise this issue with national administrations,” continued Spanswick. “There needs to be a concerted effort by the world’s broadcasting industry to highlight the vital need to retain C-band on an exclusive basis for satellite services on which broadcasters – and by extension citizens – rely.”
You can download the AIB Position Paper here.
17 December 2014
Tomsk: The pioneer Russian broadcast company TV-2, one of the country’s first independent commercial stations, may have to put its plans to celebrate its 25th anniversary next year on hold if the local state monopoly goes through with plans to turn off its transmitters for what TV-2 believes are political reasons.
On November 30, the Tomsk-based company was notified by the Russian Television and Radio Broadcasting Network (RTRS), a local division of the state monopoly that owns broadcasting facilities, that it would not be renewing TV-2’s contract when it expires at the end of December. If implemented, the decision will turn off the station’s signal on 1 January 2015, silencing yet another independent Russian media outlet.
Roscomnadzor, the federal authority for information technologies and communications, has also informed TV-2 that as it will not be able to transmit from January 2015, the station’s licence extension, which was recently granted until 2025, will be revoked.
More than 4,000 people took the streets of Tomsk on 14 December to protest the threatened closure of the broadcaster.
This is not the first time that TV-2 has been involved in a conflict with RTRS. Earlier this year, TV-2 was not able to broadcast its signal because of repair works at RTRS’ facilities that lasted an unexpectedly long time. “About a month after we had been switched off the air, because of the long repairs, we started to actively speak out in the press. There were rallies in support of us. Maybe, RTRS perceived that as political pressure and got offended,” Viktor Muchnik, TV-2 Editor-in-Chief told the BBC Russian Service.
“We can presume that some people do not like some of our reports. For example, the governor [of the Tomsk region]. But I cannot bluntly say that he is in charge of the termination of our broadcasts. I have no proof. I know that the local government often discusses our reports. And many of the reports on everyday issues are considered political. I cannot say who exactly is annoyed with our reports but certain law enforcement agencies send letters about us to the top,” Muchnik said in an interview with the BBC Russian service.
During the 24 years of its existence TV-2 has been on the verge of closure many times. Last spring, when the broadcasts were suspended, the station’s licence was nearly terminated by Roscomnadzor, the federal authority for information technologies and communications. But the company admits that never has the threat been so grave or so imminent.
TV and Radio company TV-2 was founded in November 1990 and its first broadcast was on May 15, 1991. The company is the major asset of the Tomsk Media Group holding company which also runs cable channels, an advertising agency and a number of radio stations. Four of the TV-2 team are members of the Russian TV Academy. The company has a reputation for providing accurate and independent news reporting on important political and social issues. It has been awarded 22 TEFI awards by the Russian TV Academy.
RTRS (Russian Television and Radio Broadcasting Network) is a Russian state monopoly, providing terrestrial air transmission of TV and Radio channels over the whole of the Russian Federation.
(Source: TV-2 press release)
Twelve employees of RFE/RL’s Baku bureau have been forcibly detained by Azerbaijani authorities for questioning, with more ordered to appear for questioning today or face similar detentions.