KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 21 (Bernama) -- Malaysia needs to convince some of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) countries of the importance of the establishment of the NAM News Network (NNN), a unified news pool, if it wants to avoid the fate of previous initiatives, an Iranian cabinet minister said Monday.
Iranian Culture and Islamic Guidance Minister Mohammad Hossein Saffar Harandi said that earlier initiatives, including the Non-Aligned News Agencies Pool (Nanap) set up in 1976, had failed because of lack of cooperation among the 114 member countries.
"While countries like Iran, which had the experience of being the subject of western media attacks, fully understand the importance of such news network, some do not," he told Bernama on the sidelines of the Sixth Conference of the Ministers of Information of Non-Aligned Countries (Cominac VI) here.
The Malaysia-initiated NNN is an Internet-based news exchange aimed at presenting accurate news on NAM and not biased news as portrayed by the western media.
It is also aimed at promoting a better flow of information among member countries and between them and the rest of the world.
Harandi said that to overcome the problem, Malaysia should use its bilateral relations with the NAM countries to persuade them to contribute and be active members of the NNN.
As for Iran, he said, his country would give its best to make the NNN as effective as possible through its Islamic Republic News Agency (Irna).
He added the NNN proposal was timely, given the dominance of the western media in disseminating news around the globe.
On that point, he cautioned Malaysia against efforts by those outside NAM, particularly the western media, which would like to see the NNN project fail.
"To address this, member countries must have a common understanding on what is going on around the world at the moment, especially the media confrontation between the west and the NAM countries," said Harandi.
