Al Jazeera Denies Rumsfeld Charge It Airs Killings (moved from ATSNN), page 1

Arab television channel Al Jazeera has rejected claims by Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld that the station airs beheadings of hostages by Iraqi insurgents. Speaking at an Asian defense conference Saturday, Rumsfeld said that the television network encourages terrorism by airing beheadings and other terrorist attacks.

www.reuters.co.uk
"Al Jazeera ... has never at any time transmitted pictures of killings or beheadings and ... any talk about this is absolutely unfounded," the television said in a statement.

Al Jazeera, repeatedly accused by Washington of biased reporting on Iraq, has often shown video of hostages pleading at gunpoint for their government to withdraw its troops. But it does not broadcast footage of killings, posted on the Internet by militants.

Rumsfeld earlier said: "If anyone lived in the Middle East and watched a network like the Al Jazeera day after day after day, even if he was an American, he would start waking up and asking what's wrong. But America is not wrong.

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It seems that Rumsfeld has confused Al Jazeera with some militant websites that publish videos of beheadings. Al Jazeera does however broadcast video of hostages held at gunpoint by Iraqi insurgents.

The station's offices in Kabul and Baghdad have both been hit by U.S. fire in the past, but the Pentagon stated that the strikes were unintentional.

What amazes me is that AL Jazeera aired exclusive footage of Osama Bin Laden after the events of September 2001, and yet they do not appear to have been investigated as to any possible connection to Al Qaeda, nor do they appear to have been asked to provide information regarding the source of the tapes. Does anybody know if they were investigated in this regard?

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