News

The resumption of broadcasting by Radio Caracas Televisión (RCTV) on cable and satellite on 16 July 2007 has been followed by an announcement by information and communication minister William Lara that the law will amended to oblige pay-TV cable and satellite broadcasters to carry the same occasional government programming that terrestrial broadcasters are already obliged to transmit. The system...

On May 14, more than 100 reporters, editors and executives clustered in The Wall Street Journal’s main newsroom to mark the retirement of Peter R. Kann, the longtime leader of their corporate parent, Dow Jones & Company. Mr. Kann, in rolled-up shirtsleeves, was typically self-effacing about his own contributions to the company. But the celebration of the past was muted by worry about The Journal’s...

Reporters Without Borders today condemned the government’s decision to obstruct foreign and Burmese press coverage of a national convention that has the job of writing a new constitution. No foreign journalist has been given a visa, while Burmese journalists were granted only very limited access to yesterday’s opening session. “This convention is in fact an institutional sham, and the military...

The BBC suspended several editorial staff over the phone-in scandal today as Scotland Yard revealed the Corporation may face a criminal investigation. A BBC statement said: "We can confirm that a small number of staff have been asked to step aside from their duties whilst we review issues surrounding the incidents referred to yesterday. "We would like to stress that this should not be taken to...

July 19 (Bloomberg) -- Google Inc., with sales slowing after a sevenfold increase in the past three years, is seeking acquisitions worldwide. Google says it has about a dozen people weighing deals that might be financed with stock and its $11.9 billion in cash and marketable securities. The owner of the most-popular Internet search engine announced eight purchases in the second quarter, its...

MOSCOW -- Once, Andrei Kalitin was part of a new breed of young, hot-shot Russian journalists, riding the wave of openness that washed over the country when the former Soviet Union collapsed. As a reporter for the independent, investigative television program Sovershenno Sekretno (Top Secret), Mr. Kalitin covered war, organized crime and political scandal with equal gusto - and collected a slew of...

NEW YORK: The widow of Daniel Pearl has sued more than a dozen reputed terrorists and Pakistan's largest bank, blaming them for the torture and murder of the Wall Street Journal reporter in 2002. A complaint filed Wednesday in Brooklyn federal court by Mariane Pearl and her husband's estate alleges Habib Bank Ltd. of Karachi knowingly provided financial services for al-Qaida and other terrorist...

Reporters Without Borders today condemned the detention of Abdirahman Mohammed Habane of Jamhuuriya, a daily newspaper based in Hargeisa, the capital of the breakaway state of Somaliland. He has been held since 12 July. “The hostility of the Somaliland authorities towards journalists must stop,” the press freedom organisation said. “Habane is the second journalist to be arrested in three weeks...

Reporters Without Borders today voiced its support for the demands of the family, friends and colleagues of Hrant Dink, a newspaper editor of Armenian descent who was gunned down in Istanbul exactly six months ago on 19 January 2007. “We call on the authorities to pursue their investigation and to shed light on all aspects of this case,” the press freedom organisation said. “The trial of Dink’s...

Even as News Corp. negotiated to buy Dow Jones & Co. over the past few weeks, a grim reality was increasingly evident to executives on both sides of the discussion: The downturn in the newspaper industry is getting worse. Last fall, newspaper executives and analysts were caught by surprise by the severity of a slump that took hold last summer. Since the beginning of this year, the rate of decline...