10/18/2017

RSF


Mme. Pauline ADES-MEVEL,

Please accept my apologies for not using your language, and feel free to reply, if you like, in French, which I studied at school and have continued to use, mainly passively (right now I am finishing Molière's Dom Juan!).

I am writing in relation to a report written by you, which I have not been able to track down, but which was referred to yesterday in a Sevilla digital newspaper (and perhaps elsewehere): https://www.digitalsevilla.com/2017/10/17/reporteros-sin-fronteras/

Needless to say, I regret all attacks or insults directed at journalists anywhere, though the case of the Maltese reporter Daphne Caruana Galizia beats them all, of course.

In Catalonia there is a generalised belief, based on many facts, that the whole of the Spanish press has been instructed to follow the Spanish government's guidelines, in judging Catalonia's democratically expressed will to become independent to be "illegal". They (including the three newspapers that the three members of the RSF España board work for) consistently give biassed information about Catalonia and are therefore bitterly criticised by many in Catalonia. People even chant “Premsa espanyola, manipuladora”, which you can easily corroborate with a website search. 

The deputy prime minister knows only too well that without the State grants the government gives the media, many would simply collapse. This gives her enormous bargaining power, which she has used to good effect.

In the run-up to the 9 November 2014 vote, legally covered by a law which openly stated it was NOT a referendum (despite heavy penalties later being imposed by the Spanish authorities on its political organisers), and though some were not journalists themselves, the difference in bias in chat shows across Catalonia and Spain was scandalous (if you need a summary in English please let me know):  https://www.media.cat/2014/11/06/informe-l%e2%80%99espiral-del-silenci-a-analisi/

At least two requests by Catalan individuals and organisations asking the ethics committee of the Federación de Asociaciones de Periodistas de España (FAPE) to censure hate speech specialist Eduardo Inda have been turned down.
You can also find moving cases in which a journalist working for Spanish media (like La Sexta TV, here) which are well known for their biassed reporting, is sung "Boig per tu" ("Mad over you") by hundreds of university students who had first heckled her. See the video here:

I am sure RSF is aware that John Carlin, for many years resident in Spain but who has returned to his native Britain, after writing a very good article on the Catalonia-Spain conflict (to my mind, the best in English to date):

"A veteran British journalist has been sacked by El Pais, the Spanish newspaper, over an article in The Times criticising the handling of the Catalonia crisis by Madrid and King Felipe.
"The centre-left daily ended the contract of John Carlin, 61, who has been contributing to El Pais since 1998, as a result of his essay in Saturday’s Times that was headlined “Catalan independence: arrogance of Madrid explains this chaos”.
"Carlin, who has a Spanish mother and lived for 15 years in Catalonia, wrote that Mariano Rajoy and his conservative government had largely provoked the crisis by failing to understand feelings in the region and refusing compromise..."
Source: https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/el-pais-sacks-times-essayist-for-article-attacking-king-of-spain-s3cl95bms

If RSF has not made a statement on this flagrant case, I hope it will do so. I know that other (Catalan) contributors to El País have also been dropped for their views on the conflict.

I am also aware that RSF came out in support of Spanish public TV journalists in their own, very significant protest over about the channel's biassed treatment of the conflict. My gratitude for your public position on this!

I also hope you complained publicly about the fact that Xabi Barrena (El Periódico de Catalunya) and Sofía Cabanes (NacióDigital), were attacked by the Spanish police while doing their work at polling stations on October 1st.

All in all, any harrassment of journalists in Catalonia, which I deeply regret, is mainly due to the grotesquely skewed view of the Catalan conflict of the media for which they work. Only the state of public opinion whipped up against the Catalans in at least some parts of the rest of Spain can explain why convoys of police being sent to try and prevent our October 1st referendum from taking place (but who have thereafter stayed on, thousands of them in three troopships in Barcelona and Tarragona ports, to try and physically abort Catalonia's immindent independence), were sent off by crowds to chants of "A por ellos!" ("Go get 'em!", #APorEllos). Many videos be found on YouTube. Here's one example, from Huelva: https://twitter.com/NataliaPastor/status/912376736469409792
Let me end on a favourable note. I am certain no journalists were harrassed last night in central Barcelona during the huge candle protest against the imprisonment of the presidents of the two main pro-independence NGOs, Assemblea Nacional Catalana and Òmnium Cultural. It was in the unflagging style of the independence movement: peaceful but firm. The hashtag #LlibertatJordis covers many tweets on the subject. The five minutes of silence were one of the most moving experiences of my life. https://twitter.com/marinalmansa/status/920366579900190726

Yours sincerely,


Michael Strubell MA (Oxon) MSc (Lond)
Barcelona, Catalonia



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