Kurdistan newspapers hit by lawsuit barrage

RSF says lawsuits in Iraq's Kurdish region 'attempt to crack down on press freedom', intimidate journalists.

Middle East Online

'More and more lawsuits' SULAIMANIYAH, Iraq - Newspapers and journalists in Iraq's autonomous Kurdistan region have been bombarded by a barrage of lawsuits from regional political parties, media rights groups and editors say. "In recent months more and more lawsuits have been brought against the Kurdish media," rights watchdog Reporters Without Borders (RSF) said in a report on its website titled "Iraqi Kurdistan: Lawsuits raining down on news media." "Newspaper editors nowadays seem to be spending their time in the corridors outside courtrooms," RSF said. The slew of lawsuits are "an attempt to crack down on press freedom and intimidate journalists and confuse their daily work," said Rahman Ghareeb, director of the Metro Centre to Defend Journalists. Dozens of lawsuits have been filed by various political parties this year over articles published in independent Kurdistan periodicals, editors said. "There are nine lawsuits against our newspaper," said Kamal Rauf, editor in chief of Hawlati newspaper. "The aim of the lawsuits is to intimidate and force the press to keep from engaging in the work of the independent media," he said. "There are more than 27 lawsuits against our magazine," said Ahmed Mera, the editor in chief of Lvin magazine. He said these include "six political lawsuits" filed by Kurdistan President Massud Barzani's Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP), a complaint from the public prosecutor over an article about Barzani's salary and other "lawsuits by political officials, security agencies and companies." Mera speculated that one intention of the lawsuits is to take up journalists' time with court appearances, thus preventing them from working. "Our presence in the courts leads to a waste of time. This is the goal of the parties -- to prevent us from practicing our work," he said. In another report on its website, RSF said that one lawsuit filed by the KDP, one of the two main parties in Kurdistan, sought "1 billion dollars in damages" from magazine Rojname.