Iran Revises Marie Colvin's Death; Syria's Media Cares About Censorship
It's been a big week of news for Russia, Iran, and Syria, which means their propaganda mills have been working overtime. Here's a look at what they've been spinning in today's installment of Propaganda Parade:
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Iranian Media Revises How Marie Colvin Died
Iran's chief ally Syria enraged the international community after the death of journalists Marie Colvin and Remi Ochlik from a Syrian strike against rebels in Homs. But according to Iran's Press TV, the journalists' deaths were the rebels' fault, not the Syrian government's:
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A medical source says armed groups killed the two Western journalists in Syria, rejecting allegations that they died in government shelling, Press TV reports. According to a source working for the office of the medical examiner in Syria, a nail was found in the skull of US journalist Marie Colvin, which proves she was killed by a handmade bomb.
Not a single Western source has picked up the story so due skepticism is advised. The bodies of the fallen journalists should be in France by now so the nail, which the examiner said was left in Colvin's head, should be retrievable. (You would imagine even if a nail is found, questions regarding whether it was planted will inevitably surface.) Regardless, this wouldn't be the first time Iran's state media organs play defense for Syria. Take a look at this whopper from last month: "President al-Assad committed to ending Syria unrest" read the headline. What follows is an interview with a "political analyst" who says "Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and his close team are totally committed to a comprehensive program of reforms."
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Russian TV Dismisses Anti-Putin Protesters
With discontent swirling in Russia following election fraud allegations, government-funded TV network RT is turning the gimlet eye toward anti-Putin protesters. To it's credit, RT invited on Michael Idov this week, a fair-minded observer and editor of Russian GQ. But it turns out, the questions for Idov were about as slanted as they could be. He tweeted an image of the queries RT prepared for him below:
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After appearing on the network, he tells us that the "pro-regime bent" was "incredibly obvious." But it got worse when they invited Russian GQ's political blogger Andrew Ryvkin. "Watch them try to ask him, three different ways, if the protesters had the police crackdown coming to them":
Syrian Media Gets Serious About Censorship... American Censorship
While thousands of Syrians have been slaughtered in the last year, Syrian state radio and TV have cheered on President Bashar al-Assad's brutal regime. For that collusion, the Obama administration added the country's television and radio arms to its sanctions list on Monday. Suddenly, SANA is really concerned about the issue of media censorship. And of all places to lodge its complaint, it told the state-owned newspaper China Daily about how averse America is to freedom of expression. " The new measure is a flagrant contradiction to the US claims of defending the freedom of s peech and opinion ," SANA told China Daily. "T he sanctions also reflect the fact of the American-Western disturbance over the role of the state media in exposing the disinformation campaign against Syria ." Yeah. once SANA stops censoring the Syrian rebels (see any representation here?) then we'll take issues of censorship a little more seriously.
