In a letter Thursday to the Pentagon inspector general, Di Rita asked for a comprehensive review in light of recent disclosures that other government agencies paid journalists to promote administration policies. Sarah Strachan, said many of the journalists work primarily for news organizations, although she said the details of those employers could not be provided for privacy reasons. Another European Command spokesman, Air Force Maj. message.Ībout 50 paid correspondents contribute to Southeast European Times, including one American journalist based in Sarajevo, Bosnia, Kaufman said. He cited as an example a proposed headline that originally read, “Croatian Prime Minister Remembers Holocaust Victims,” which European Command changed to “Croatian Prime Minister Remarks on Dangers of Extremism,” which Kaufman said “more closely reinforced” the U.S. Kaufman said information warfare experts at European Command do not edit the stories written by contributing journalists for Southeast European Times, but they “review” the stories after they are processed by Anteon editors, and they sometimes change the headlines. The Balkans Web site also has articles and commentary by about 50 journalists who Kaufman said are paid by European Command through a private contractor, Anteon Corp., an information technology company based in Fairfax, Va. The Pentagon’s role in these Web sites was first reported by CNN on Thursday. Derek Kaufman, a European Command spokesman.īoth sites carry news stories compiled from The Associated Press, Reuters and other news organizations. The second site, called Magharebia and aimed at the Maghreb region that encompasses Algeria, Libya, Mauritania, Morocco and Tunisia, is still in development and has not reached the stage of having paid correspondents, said Air Force Lt. forces and military activities in Europe and parts of Africa. European Command.” That is the military organization based in Germany responsible for U.S. government but contain a linked disclaimer that says they are “sponsored by the U.S. LIVES STILL IN DANGERĪmnesty International and other rights monitors have called for an independent investigation into the conduct of both sides during the final burst of the conflict, in which nearly 300,000 people escaped rebel-held areas and are now being held in government-run refugee camps.Īdams of Human Rights Watch said it was unacceptable that Sri Lanka’s government has maintained restrictions on access to the detained, displaced and wounded since the fighting ended.The Balkans Web site, called Southeast European Times, as well as a second aimed at audiences in North Africa, have no immediately obvious connection to the U.S. While telling Sri Lanka’s government to investigate all allegations of abuses and to bring perpetrators to justice, the Western resolution, does not call for an international inquiry to be launched into allegations of abuses during the military’s onslaught to crush to Tamil Tiger rebels. ![]() examination of the conflict was “ill-timed” and said the international community should focus now on helping the country rebuild after last week’s end to its 25-year civil war.Ĭolombo has marshalled China, Russia, India, Pakistan and other regional allies to try to deflect scrutiny of its record in a resolution in Geneva that stresses the rights of states to act without outside interference in their national matters.īut another resolution, prepared by Switzerland and backed by 30 states including France, Britain, Germany, Canada, Mexico and Mauritius, calls for “full, safe and unhindered access of humanitarian assistance to all persons in need throughout the country” and says Colombo must do so without discrimination. “Although the fighting has stopped, the humanitarian situation is still alarming and real improvements are needed,” the group’s Asia director Brad Adams said in a statement. ![]() Human Rights Watch said Sri Lanka should be pushed at the United Nations Human Rights Council, meeting for an emergency session this week, to allow aid workers and journalists into the country’s camps and detention centres, stressing “respect for human rights is just as essential after a conflict ends.” Human Rights Council must insist on humanitarian access to camps of tens of thousands of refugees from Sri Lanka’s war, rights groups said Monday, to ease a situation they called “alarming” and a “catastrophe.”
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