8/9/2019 SKeyes Denounces the Sacking of the Journalist Octavia
Nasr by CNN 8-7-10 1
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Samir Kassir Foundation , Aref Saghieh Bldg.( Ground Floor), 63,
Zahrani St., Sioufi, Achrafieh, Beirut, LebanonTel /Fax: 00961 1
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[email protected]
Beirut, July 8, 2010Press Release
SKeyes denounces the sacking of the journalist Octavia Nasr by
CNN,for praising Fadlallah.
In a surprising move, the U.S television network CNN sacked the
Senior Editor of Mideast affairs Octavia Nasr, for praising the
Lebanese Shiite cleric Mohammed HusseinFadlallah, who passed away
last Sunday. The journalist Nasr had mentioned through theTwitter
internet service that she was sad to hear of the passing of Sayyed
MohammadHussein Fadlallah.Nasr, who had been working for CNN since
1990, mentioned in her Twitter message thatFadlallah was one of
Hezbollah's giants [that] I respect a lot... Nasr soon expressed
her deep regret on CNNs website, and said, It was an error of
judgment for me to write such a simplistic co mment. She then
clarified, I used thewords "respect" and "sad" because Fadlallah
took a contrarian and pioneering standamong Shia clerics on woman's
rights, adding that, This does not mean I respected himfor what
else he did or said. However, CNN r ejected her apology and said
that Nasrs credibility had beenundermined. In an internal CNN memo
, CNN Internationals senior vice president for newsgathering,
Parisa Khosravi, said that she discussed the matter with the
journalist
Nasr, and decided that she must leave the station. Octavia Nasr
covered the major conflicts in the region for CNN in the past
twenty years,and hosted the programs CNN World Report and CNN
International World News from1993 to 2003.It must be mentioned here
that the United Sta tes government had listed Fadlallahs nameon
what it designates as the international terrorists list. Her
dismissal from CNN takes place a month after the resignation of the
Senior WhiteHouse Correspondent Helen Thomas, who was forced to
retire after her controversialremarks on Israel.The SKeyes Centre
for Media and Cultural Freedoms denounces this arbitrary decision
todismiss the colleague that served CNN over twenty years, and
considers it to be a flagrantviolation of the freedom of expression
and the freedom of opinion, especially as it isbeing perpetrated by
a media outlet that is based in a prestigious democratic
andmulticultural country. Neither the right to the freedom of
expression, which was practicedoutside of the scope of Nasrs
profess ion, nor her apology pushed the station to reverse
itsdecision.
