Human Rights Day

There has been a lot of chatter surrounding the statement that the newly established Doha Centre for Media Freedom put out on the 11 November 2008.

Here is the actual statement that is up on their website:

The Doha Centre for Media Freedom calls on Qatar’s government to amend the country’s press law. “The National Human Rights Day (November 11) should be the occasion to make a few suggestions as to how the country’s much-lauded press freedom might be expanded,” it said.

Days that commemorate are useful if they are not filled with big speeches far removed from reality but instead lead to change, through as detailed and honest a picture of the situation as possible. Qatar’s National Human Rights Day on November 11 can be of use to everyone if we take the opportunity to state the facts. Among the rights the Day celebrates is freedom of expression, which is the key to other human rights.

Qatar has nothing to be ashamed of in this respect. It sponsored the Arab world’s first satellite TV network which gave a voice not just to those in power but to those who disagreed with them, as reflected by the station’s famous slogan of "The Opinion and the Other Opinion." This is a revolution in the region.

The presence in Qatar for the past few months of the Doha Centre for Media Freedom is another first. Until now, all international human rights organisations (and the Doha Centre is one) have been based in Western countries.

Qatar’s top leaders have also made many pledges to support freedom of expression. They took a principled stand when nearly all Arab League information ministers wanted to adopt a charter curbing the freedom of satellite TV stations to broadcast.

Qatar has many virtues in a region where countless regimes abuse press freedom and attack journalists. This does not mean, of course, that it has no press freedom problems. Nearly all journalists in Qatar would agree there is self-censorship and that cultural tradition favours consensus over inconvenient truths. So National Human Rights Day should be the occasion to make a few suggestions as to how the country’s much-lauded press freedom might be expanded. We will make just two.