Watching the BBC's newswatch?

Is that Samira over in that undignified fake post?

Here is the first add on:
First thing to do is to watch the BBC when you are sober.
Being in control of most of the faculties helps significantly.
Then you look at what the BBC leaves out.
What asides they insert making those look quite harmless.

For instance, a new face that the BBC NEWS CHANNEL has introduced in the recent past is another young, white, female person who appears to be associated with the title NEW STATESMAN.

She is a different one from the two earlier ones the News Channel had. Those were Ms Lewis and the "unstoppable" Labour Councillor from the London Borough of Southwark.

This Third New Statesman Female Panellist on the News Channel's "The Papers" [ how the £Billion investment helps rename the bits here and there] was uttering her wisdom about the takeover of Egypt by the Army again.

When it came to refer to people being killed, and the people who had been on the just ousted Morsi were reported to have been killed, the Third Young Female Wise person from the New Statesman paused, nonchalantly, and then she paused and shook her head, ever so elegantly and nonchalantly, and then said words to the effect that you can't help everyone!

That is to say, if the casualties were on Morsi's side then you really should not bother to treat them as fi they warrant the kind of shock, horror, outrage that you could display in solidarity with those who understand "our values..."!!


Want some more?

Here's the email address for Samira Ahmed:

 Samira.Ahmed@bbc.co.uk

On May 10th 2013, I made an appeal to the BBC Trust's Complaints and Appeals Board that they review the decision of the BBC Trust’s Senior Editorial Strategy Adviser disallowing my appeal against what I considered was the BBC Executive's inadequate response to my original complaint to the BBC about what I termed as the “paucity of televisual news coverage by the BBC in regard to the aftermath of the war in Sri Lanka in 2009, such as investigations of genocide at the end of the conflict in May 2009”, mentioning Newsnight in particular as the BBC's preeminent current affairs programme. In particular, I argued that the BBC's coverage compared unfavourably with Channel 4 which I pointed out have produced two hour-long documentaries on alleged war crimes by the Sri Lankan government. Since Stage-2 of my complaint which was sent on the 11th October 2012 (addressed to the former Head-of-News Helen Boaden), Newsnight did broadcast a report by Lyse Doucet on the issue of Sri Lanka on 13th Nov 2012. However, previous to this, Newsnight had failed to feature any report on the post-conflict situation in Sri Lanka, nor most lamentably, any examination of what happened at the end of the civil war in the country, since a report they did on the country on 27th April 2009 in the closing weeks of the conflict. The Newsnight (and BBC News 24) report on 13th November was subject to a separate complaint by myself , primarily as to why the report failed to mention that the copy of the UN leaked report by the BBC included sections of text which were redacted, to which they took 7 months and 3 weeks to respond.

The basis of my appeal was that Ms Harris, the Head of Accountability, BBC News, in her response on the 7th February 2013 to my Stage-2 appeal had in my opinion avoided addressing my contention that the BBC have failed to have given this ‘story’ a due-level of emphasis since the end of the conflict in terms of analysis within it’s television output and instead have inexplicably dedicated a disproportionately small level of coverage to a conflict of such colossal magnitude in view of the extent of human slaughter and evidence of genocide. In particular, I draw attention to the severely limited analysis of the issue of war crimes and substantial loss of life, and of how the Sri Lankan government patently failed its primary responsibility to protect its own population during the conflict, including indiscriminate bombing of so-called "no-fire zones" in dereliction of it’s duty to abide by the Geneva Convention, plus evidence of the use of chemical weapons by the Sri Lankan Army, and the large-scale loss of life in the last few days of the conflict at Mullaitivu in Vanni. There are no official casualty figures for these last few days of the conflict and official estimates of the death toll for the final four months of the civil war (mid-January to mid-May) are disputed. A US State Department report has suggested that the actual casualty figures were probably much higher than the UN's estimates of 15,000 to 20,000, and that significant numbers of casualties weren't recorded.

On 22nd May 2013, the Complaints and Appeals Board (CAB) considered my request for an appeal to the BBC Trust - the minutes of which were approved at the Trust's following meeting on the 20th June. The Trust’s Senior Editorial Strategy Adviser (Trust’s Adviser) considered that my appeal did not have a reasonable prospect of success. On re-reading the correspondence, the Trust’s Adviser noted that the Head of Accountability, BBC News, had clearly explained that news and programme teams made decisions about which stories they would cover, based on their journalistic judgment. Her letter of 7 February 2013 stated:
“As you will appreciate, there is a huge demand for coverage and Newsnight’s editorial team has to be selective in terms of where it chooses to deploy. Not only is this a question of resources, but the programme must also balance its foreign and domestic reporting. Its editorial and production teams select stories where they can give added value using correspondents' expertise, be it on a developing and running story or an investigation."

Their correspondence on the 7th February 2013 also said:
"[…] All of these are judgements, which, of course, are subjective, albeit rooted in journalistic knowledge, experience and with the audience at the heart of the decision-making. Editors are well aware that not all in their audiences will always agree with a programme’s news priorities; after all, News is not an exact science.”

The Panel, in their last response near the end of June quoting the decision by the Complaints and Appeals Board in their meeting on 22nd May 2013, also asserted that editorial decisions about the level of coverage afforded to any particular news story or event, and about which outlet a news story or event should be covered on, clearly fell within the direction of the editorial and creative output of the BBC.

Furthermore, the Panel also noted that the BBC had provided evidence that the Sri Lankan situation had been covered. Ms Harris had said that:
“…BBC News has been the only international broadcaster with a permanent correspondent based in Colombo. Charlie Haviland, who will be in post until the end of next month, has regularly filed for TV, radio and online on news stories from there over the last three years, tracking all the main human rights issues, the legacy of the end of the war and the intensifying centralisation of power in the hands of the presidential family”.

However, Ms Harris provided a list of url links to various pieces of BBC journalism over the past 3 years in regard to Sri Lanka (website, audio and television reports). However, only two of the url links Ms Harris provided are in actual fact television reports, rather supporting my contention that BBC television output on the issue of Sri Lanka has been sparse in the 3 years and 9 months since the end of the conflict.

By way of explanation, Ms Harris reiterated what Lizzi Watson from Newsnight said in the earlier correspondence, that news teams have had difficulty in the past in obtaining visa access in Sri Lanka. However, as I said in my last correspondence, information about what has happened in the country and ongoing issues in the country are easily obtainable from external information sources, including within the UK. For example, Lyse Doucet ‘s Newsnight report utilised the opinions and witness testimonies of UK residents.

Furthermore, Ms Harris referred to the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting, CHOGM, due to take place in Sri Lanka in November, commenting that there is every intention BBC will cover the event. In light of this, I think it defies credibility that BBC Newsgathering has inexplicably closed the BBC’s bureau in Colombo.

I remain dissatisfied with the response of the BBC Trust, being as it is that decisions of the Trust and its Committees are final and there is no right of appeal within the BBC. In light of evidence provided by the BBC about the level of coverage thus far dedicated to the issue of Sri Lanka, I note that the BBC Trust in their final reply stated that:
"The Panel agreed that there was scope for further reporting on events in Sri Lanka but that such decisions were outside the remit of the Trust."

Being as it is that in this complaint process which I have pursued, I have no opportunity of further engagement with the BBC Executive or BBC News teams, I have written to Samira Ahmed - the main correspondent at BBC Newswatch to invite her to consider these issues, and if possible, to cover some of the issues I have raised, especially in light of the fact that human rights groups have sustained their criticism that the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting, CHOGM, very much remains on course to take place in Sri Lanka in November, whilst the Canadian government have announced they will be boycotting the event. In light of this, I have asked her if she thinks the world's preeminent news corporation - the BBC - should cover the issue of debate as to the legitimacy of Sri Lanka's hosting of this event?

In my opinion, the BBC's lack of coverage on the issue of Sri Lanka since 2009 puts the onus on them to fulfill this even more so. As I said in my correspondence to the BBC already, any media outlet that was serious about covering international news from across the globe with a consistent assiduity in pursuing the most challenging and emotive news stories – as the BBC claims to attain to doing in it’s charter - should have rigorously applied such guiding principles to the extent of the human rights catastrophe which occurred during the final months of the conflict in Sri Lanka in 2009.

The BBC promotes itself as 'impartial' and 'objective'. This fools the public, including the Left, into thinking that they systematically betray their professionalism by not being objective and by having an agenda. But we do not understand their idea of professionalism.

THis was seen recently in a studio discussion about Syria. The BBC and their invited experts could not bring themselves to admitting that even Qatar opinion polls showed a majority of Syrians in support of Assad, that the rebels were on the verge of defeat, rebel enclaves were sites for extremist dictatorships. The whole discussion was based on a myth. Why is this?

It was because the UK government and the opposition believed in the myth.

That is, BBC professionalism operates in a political agenda set by the Executve and the Opposition. The BBC may reflect views advanced by MPs but they would marginalise or criticise views outside of the Executive-Opposition framework.

Objective, therefore, is reflecting Opposition criticisms of the Executive. There is therefore a concensus on a wide range of issues.

Therefore, the BBC reports that union influence in the Labour Party is somehow malacious because that is the perspective adopted by both the Labour leadership and the government. The fact that there appears to be little evidence to support this is not even important to the BBC.

It was Greg Dyke as BBC DG who allowed me to be defamed.
I complained and they ignored it all.
It would have required about £30 K to start a half-decent action in defamation.
So I had to wait for the BBC to make amends.
10 years [almost] on, I am still waiting.
BBC has not made amends.