Tuesday, April 09, 2013

Iraq does executions, press doesn't do corrections


Amnesty Interanational today issues a new report on the death penalty around the globe.  They note the "alarming escalation in executions in Iraq."  They note that the top 5 countries for executions are China, then Iran, then Iraq, then Saudi Arabia and then the United States.

Let's stay with death for a moment.  Yesterday we noted that UNAMI released a statement and we focused on the increased violence to wait and see what others would focus on?  Would one outlet get honest?  Would others stop their whoring?  No and no.

Drop back to the April 1st snapshot.  You'll see Iraq Body Count counted 407 deaths.  AKE counted at least 355 deaths (that was a rough estimate that included 3 days of February and left out six days of March) while AFP insisted it was only 271 deaths.

Go the UNAMI link or go Mu Xuequan (Xinhua) report on the UNAMI statement and see that the United Nations counts 456 deaths in Iraq in the month of March.



Prashant Rao can't stop Tweeting.  No matter how insignificant (see the laughable attempt by the laughable Reider Vissar to do stand up which Prashant re-Tweets).   And let's see, four hours ago he discovered the Washington Post column -- not op-ed,  a column runs on the op-ed pages.  Please remember you're not on Hardball or some other cheap and tacky TV show where yokels pretend to be insiders.  High up the chain (far above Prashant's pay grade) calling a colum an "op-ed" is the same as using the term "ain't" outside of a quote -- it demonstrates both ignorance and lack of sophistication.


But four hours ago, Prashant discovered Nouri's column.  We covered in yesterday's snapshot. Do try to keep up.

If you scroll back far enough, you'll find this:

  2. 8 Apr
    - violence totals for March: 456 dead, 1153 wounded. Higher than ); Almost 3x government death toll. (
    Expand




Seems if you asserted that there were only 271 violent deaths in March and the United Nations says there were 456, that's something you need to write about.  Or at least Tweet.  Or are you saying the UN doesn't know how to count?

185 deaths they were off for one month.

185 errors.

You'd think it would be acknowledged -- in something other than a Tweet -- an  an error that large really calls for re-filing and not a mere Tweet.

In fairness, AFP is wrong today only because they are the only outlet that keeps their own count.  (In more fairness, Prashant was out of Iraq for a period and when he was out of Iraq, no one else at AFP was apparently keeping the count.)

Reuters doesn't try.  They did, however, repeat the Iraq government's claim that there were only 163 violent deaths in March.  CNN noted the claim as well.

163 is a lot worse than 271.

456 minus 163 is 293.  (Check my math.) So AFP's off by 185 but Reuters and CNN are off by 293.

So they've all had 24 hours, these outlets,  where's the correction?

And no, a Tweet to cover a report doesn't count as a correction.  It really doesn't even count as amplifcation.

Here's UNAMI's statement  from yesterday in full:

 UN Releases Civilian Casualty Figures for March
Baghdad, 8 April 2013 – According to figures released today by UNAMI, a minimum of 229 civilians were killed and a further 853 were wounded in acts of terrorism and armed violence in Iraq during March 2013. A further 227 members of the Iraqi security forces were killed and 300 were wounded as a result of such attacks.

“The United Nations deplores the continuing loss of civilian life resulting from acts of terrorism and armed conflict,” said Mr. Francesco Motta, the Chief Human Rights Officer of UNAMI and Representative of the High Commissioner for Human Rights in Iraq. “Of equal concern is the toll on members of Iraq's security forces who are called upon on a daily basis to combat terrorism and violence and to protect the lives of civilians and civilian infrastructure,” he said.


UNAMI remains concerned at the rise in violence in Iraq and the increasing toll on lives of Iraqi civilians and its detrimental impact on civilian infrastructure. Iraqi continues to suffer from attacks perpetrated by a number of terrorist groups, among them Al-Qaeda in Iraq and the Islamic State of Iraq. The most affected areas remain Baghdad, and the governorates of Anbar, Salahuddin and the disputed areas of Ninewa and Kirkuk.



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