Robert Menard

DOHA: Doha Centre for Media Freedom has announced yesterday that it has terminated the services of Robert Ménard, director-general of the Centre beginning from June.

The decision was taken following Ménard’s announcement that he had quit his post and left Doha. The statement added that Doha Centre for Media Freedom will continue carrying out its mission in institutional manner and as per its by-laws. QNA/THE PENINSULA

http://www.thepenins...

Robert Ménard and his team have left the Doha Centre for Media Freedom. "The Centre has been suffocated. We no longer have either the freedom or the resources to do our work", he explained.

Ménard concluded: "I do not doubt the sincerity of Her Highness Sheikha Mozah and her determination to advance the cause of freedom, especially media freedom. But she is not alone. And those who prefer to retain the status quo are many, powerful and obstinate.

"No-one but her would have dared imagine a Centre like the one we have built here. Maybe Sheikha Mozah is too far ahead of her fellow citizens, too ’modern’ for political figures attached to the status quo, too aware of the challenges in this world for dignitaries concerned only with their own interests."

For the full article:

Is death imminent for the Doha Center for Media Freedom's motto and mission? From Al-Sharq via the Huffington Post (http://www.huffingto...):

The man whose name has been tied for years to press freedom and the defense of journalists worldwide from his Paris perch, then transplanted to Doha to start a similar gig, has become the bête noire of a leading Qatari paper that accused him of promoting "immorality" and insulting Qataris.

"It's been a year since the center opened, and six months since it became operational, at phenomenal cost, and it was hoped it would provide added value to the local landscape, but it hasn't, and its limelight-seeking director has limited himself to fiery statements," blasted the editor in chief of the daily Al Sharq on Sunday.

The editor was referring to Robert Menard, who set up the Doha Centre for Media Freedom , with blessings from Qatar's emir, Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani, and under the patronage of the country's first lady, Sheikha Mozah bint Nasser al-Missned. Editor Jaber Al Harmi also slammed Menard for not being a team player, a trait he alleged the Frenchman carried over from the time he founded and headed Reporters Sans Frontiers, or Reporters Without Borders.

"Menard not only got rid of Qataris from the organization, but repeatedly insulted the state of Qatar; most recently by lambasting our brothers in Dubai who tried to limit the toxic effects of obscene websites, notably through YouTube in the United Arab Emirates," Al Harmi said. He added that Menard's excoriation of the Dubai police chief -- charged with maintaining the Emirates' moral standards - meant the former wanted the latter to allow websites that insulted Islam and deities and promoted blasphemy in the name of press freedom...

read the rest of the article on the Huffington Post:

Do you think this is simply a case of a bad match between the director of the DCMF and TPTB in Qatar?

Or if the DCMF is an oxymoron to begin with and an idea that could never work here?

Just when we thought that people forgot about the danes. Here it comes again, this time in Doha. Apparently, lemming Rose Culture Editor of the Jyllands-Posten was in Doha last saturday. Being invited by DCMF. Outraged sms, emails, & local blog posts calling to close down the DCMF.

The Peninsula reported:

DOHA: Doha was seething with anger and resentment last evening with heated debates in majlises and drawing rooms and people exchanging angry messages — at least some calling Al Adeed (the security helpline set up by the Interior Ministry) after news that controversial Danish journalist, Flemming Rose, Culture Editor of the Jyllands-Posten, who had commissioned and published a series of cartoons derogatory to the Prophet Muhammed (PBUH) was in the city for the World Press Freedom Day conference.

The whispers grew into a raging controversy late in the evening with most citizens and expatriates alike upset with the news after Ahmad Ali, former editor-in-chief and now General Manager of Al Watan daily, in a signed editorial in yesterday’s edition of the newspaper lambasted the organisers of the Doha Center for Media Freedom for inviting Rose for the World Press Freedom Day conference. By inviting the controversial figure, who had insulted the Prophet (PBUH) by publishing the cartoons, he wrote, the Center’s head Robert Menard had insulted all Muslims. “Menard should know that there is a red line to media freedom and you cannot cross that border.” We cannot accept any media freedom that insults our dear Prophet,” Ahmad wrote.

Reporters Without Borders is deeply concerned about a hardening in the attitude of the Qatari authorities towards the Doha Centre for Media Freedom. Hajar Smouni, head of research at the Centre and a former member of the Reporters Without Borders staff, was prevented from leaving Qatar today.

“The Doha Centre has for months been struggling to keep its independence and is under pressure from the Qatari authorities,” Reporters Without Borders secretary-general Jean-François Julliard said. “This ban is a violation of the undertakings Qatar gave to the Doha Centre.”

By Anwar Elshamy
THE chief of the Doha Centre for Media Freedom (DCMF) yesterday called on Qatar to amend its press law, while threatening to leave if the law was not amended.
Addressing a press conference to release the first annual report by the DCMF on media freedom in the Middle East and North Africa, Robert Menard, the director general of the centre, said the Qatari press law, which was issued in 1979, had never been amended in spite of a revolution in the local media scene in the country. “Without changing the status of press freedom in Qatar, it would be impossible for the centre to criticise any other country for imposing restrictions on media freedom,” Menard said.