Editor-In-Chief of U.S.-Funded Iraqi Newspaper Quits, Complaining of American Control – from TBO.com
The head of a U.S.-funded Iraqi newspaper quit and said Monday he was taking almost his entire staff with him because of American interference in the publication.
On a front-page editorial of the Al-Sabah newspaper, editor-in-chief Ismail Zayer said he and his staff were “celebrating the end of a nightmare we have suffered from for months … We want independence. They (the Americans) refuse.”
Al-Sabah was set up by U.S. officials with funding from the Pentagon soon after the fall of Saddam Hussein last year. Since its first issue in July, many Iraqis have considered it the mouthpiece of the U.S.-led coalition, along with the U.S.-funded television station Al-Iraqiya.
Zayer said almost the entire staff left the paper along with him and that they were launching a new paper called Al-Sabah Al-Jedid (“The New Morning”), which would begin publishing Tuesday.
I wish some of our American journalists would have this much integrity…