Iraq Kurd ruling party calls for magazine closure

ARBIL, May 18, 2011 (AFP) - Iraqi Kurdistan's biggest political party has sued one of the region's magazines, calling for it to be closed after it alleged the bloc was plotting to kill rival leaders, officials said Wednesday.
The Kurdistan Democratic Party of regional president Massud Barzani filed the libel suit on Tuesday against Lvin magazine over an article published May 1, according to Jaafar Ibrahim, a KDP spokesman.
click here to read the article


In the article, Lvin accused the KDP and its ruling alliance partner, the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan of Iraqi President Jalal Talabani, of wanting to assassinate the leaders of three smaller opposition groups.
"We filed a case of libel against Lvin magazine and we are asking for it to be closed and for compensation," Ibrahim said. "It is not reasonable to make that kind of attack."
The lawsuit is the second against Lvin over the article, with Talabani already having filed his own case earlier this month, though he did not ask for the magazine to be shuttered, according to Saadi Bira, an official in the PUK's political bureau.
Lvin editor Ahmed Mera described the lawsuits as illegal, and insisted they were part of "a political conspiracy against the free press, and our magazine in particular."
Mera told AFP the KDP had also asked for damages totalling one billion Iraqi dinars ($858,000), but KDP spokesman Ibrahim denied this.
Paris-based press watchdog Reporters Without Borders (RSF) said in a statement on Wednesday that "the survival of Lvin magazine... is threatened" by the KDP's legal action.
"Both the lawsuits against Lvin... are part of a campaign by the authorities to harass journalists and media that that have been covering the protests taking place in Kurdistan since mid-February," RSF added.
Demonstrations have been taking place in the autonomous Iraqi region over nepotism and corruption in the government, which has been dominated by the KDP and the PUK for decades.
Earlier this year, RSF warned that "more and more lawsuits have been brought against the Kurdish media," while Rahman Ghareeb, the director of Kurdish press freedoms organisation Metro, said the slew of lawsuits were "an attempt to crack down on press freedom and intimidate journalists."
In January, senior KDP official Najirvan Barzani announced that the party would withdraw all of its lawsuits against newspapers and writers "as a goodwill gesture".
str-sf/jac/psr/dv
© Copyright AFP 2011.