BBC Caught In Mass Public Deception With Iran Propaganda

by Paul Joseph Watson, Infowars, 18 June 2009


The BBC has again been caught engaging in mass public deception by using photographs of pro-Ahmadinejad rallies in Iran and claiming they represent anti-government protests in favor of Hossein Mousavi.

An image used by the L.A. Times on the front page of its website Tuesday showed Iranian President Ahmadinejad waving to a crowd of supporters at a public event.

In a story covering the election protests yesterday, the BBC News website used a closer shot of the same scene, but with Ahmadinejad cut out of the frame. The caption under the photograph read, ‘Supporters of Mir Hossein Mousavi again defied a ban on protests’.

The BBC photograph is clearly a similar shot of the same pro-Ahmadinejad rally featured in the L.A. Times image, yet the caption erroneously claims it represents anti-Ahmadinejad protesters.

“Well I guess it sure was a popular fictional rally for Mousavi, because I later noticed while browsing the news sites a familiar picture on the BBC’s lead Iran story - it shows the same crowd, zoomed in to cut out Ahmadinejad,” a reader told the WhatReallyHappened website. “It is clearly the same protest as in the background are the same tree and odd circular building. However, the BBC managed to outdo the LA times in quality reporting - their actual comment under the photo from the huge PRO-Ahmadinejad rally reads ‘Supporters of Mir Hossein Mousavi again defied a ban on protests’ - a blatant lie and deliberately misleading description of what is actually occurring in Iran!”

As soon as the truth about the misrepresented images surfaced on the WhatReallyHappened website yesterday, the BBC changed the photo caption on their original article.

This is not the first time the BBC has been caught red-handed using crude image and video framing techniques for the purposes of political propaganda.

During the fall of Baghdad in April 2003, the BBC and other mainstream news outlets broadcast closely framed footage of the “mass uprising” during which Iraqis, aided by U.S. troops, toppled the Saddam Hussein statue in Fardus Square.

The closely framed footage was used to imply that hundreds or thousands of Iraqis were involved in a Berlin Wall-style “historic” liberation, yet when wide angle shots were later published on the Internet, footage that was never broadcast on live television, the reality of the “mass uprising” became clear. The crowd around the statue was sparse and consisted mostly of U.S. troops and journalists. The BBC later had to admit that only “dozens” of Iraqis had participated in toppling the statue. The entire scene was a manufactured farce yet the propaganda technique of blocking wide-angle shots from being broadcast convinced the world that the event represented a triumphant and historic mass popular uprising on behalf of the Iraqi people.

Whatever your views on the legitimacy of Ahmadinejad and the accuracy of the Iranian election results, the fact that the Anglo-American establishment and its media organs are exploiting and fanning the flames of chaos in Iran to provoke further instability is unquestionable.

Indeed, the U.S. State Department, which routinely demonizes the Internet as a tool of extremists and terrorists when it is used to criticize U.S. foreign policy, took the unprecedented step today of requesting that Twitter.com “delay planned maintenance work so that Iranian protesters can continue to use it to post images and reports of unrest,” according to a London Times report.


link:

 http://www.infowars.com/bbc-caught-in-mass-public-deception-with-iran-propaganda/

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Dishonest reporting by the BBC: An open letter to the Press Complaints Commission



Sunday, 21 June 2009
Attn: Mr Simon Yip
Press Complaints Commission
Halton House
20/23 Holborn
London
EC1N 2JD


Ref: BBC: Deliberate deception and Propaganda


Dear Mr Yip,

I have written to you on previous occasions with complaints about widespread bias in press reporting in general and the ongoing deception of the British public (and the general public of the western world at large for that matter) in political matters by a now globally and privately controlled media. I have also expressed the view that the scope of the provisions of the Code of Practice and terms of reference of the PCC are far too narrow to ensure that the media fulfils its most valuable function – that of informing and facilitating a healthy democracy - and that the PCC should be the primary force at work to address this problem.

The reporting of the current crisis in Iran is an extreme case of this problem. There is a clear intention in western reporting of the situation to inflame unrest within Iran and to discredit the Iranian political system. Open discussion of the prospect of destabilizing the government and the possibility of revolution in a situation of unrest within Britain would be unthinkable. The hypocrisy of engaging in such speculations about another country only accentuates the abject failure of our media to responsibly and properly perform its function of providing information objectively and truthfully as is essential for a healthy democracy.

However, as this is a matter “out of scope” for the PCC I can only mention it as context for my specific complaint against the BBC in relation to this clear and obvious case of willfully dishonest reporting. You will find the full details of the matter at:

 http://www.infowars.com/bbc-caught-in-mass-public-deception-with-iran-propaganda/


In summary, the issue is this:

The BBC has used a photograph of a public rally in Iran and presented it as a pro-Mousavi demonstration in protest of the election and in defiance of a ban on demonstrations.

The photograph is in fact a cut–down version of a photograph published in the LA Times in a story about a pro-Ahmadinejad rally. It is the same photograph! In the BBC version the frame has been cropped to exclude Ahmadinejad and include only the crowd.

I feel that the PCC should investigate the facts of this matter to confirm for yourselves that this is a clear and deliberate deception of the public, a betrayal of public trust and a demonstration of complete lack of integrity in reporting on the part of the BBC.

I also believe that this dishonest report should be traced to those responsible and steps taken to ensure that they are removed from positions in which their irresponsible actions pose a risk to the health of British democracy and international relations.

Yours Sincerely,

Allen L. Jasson

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