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| Iraq |
| Taking a screwdriver to the truth |
| 2005-09-24 |
| "YOU have been pushed upon us,â the British media operations officer announced as he greeted a party of six journalists arriving in Basra to report on Mondayâs confrontation between British troops and the Basra police. It was an inauspicious start to our efforts to inform the British public how their troops are faring in an increasingly turbulent region of southern Iraq. The 36 hours that followed provided an insight into the control that the Ministry of Defence exerts upon the flow of information reaching Britain from Iraq. It ended with our being put back on a flight to Baghdad, The Timesâs request to âembedâ for a few days with the Coldstream Guards in Basra having been rejected. British officers in the field refer disparagingly to the current information policy, emanating from a Government nervous of criticism over its policy in Iraq, as âthe screwdriverâ. It does few favours to the soldiers serving in Iraq or to the society that pays for them to be there. In Basra this week the official line, dictated to media operations officers in Iraq by printed handouts that tell them which questions they can answer and what the answers are, was that Mondayâs events were of limited significance. Echoing almost verbatim the account released by the MoD in London, officials at the headquarters of the Multinational Division in Basra told us that the violence against British troops involved a crowd of between 150 and 200 rioting Iraqis; that the police station at the centre of the violence was finally entered by British troops to ascertain whether the two British prisoners were still there; that the three British casualties were in a ânon-life-threateningâ condition; and that only 2 per cent of the violence in Iraq occurs in Basra. During later briefings by those directly involved in the events, and after the few hours we actually managed to spend with the confident, informative and friendly Coldstream Guards, a different picture emerged. The rioting mob was 1,000-strong. Baton rounds and live fire were used to prevent the crowd from killing escaping Warrior crew members. An unknown number of Iraqis were killed. One British casualty was seriously burnt and has been evacuated to hospital in Britain. The police station was breached by an armoured vehicle to rescue a six-man negotiating team trapped inside. The Iraqi police involved are a powerful mafia gang with terrorist links, unaccountable to the city police chief, who enjoy the support of figures at government level. It seemed reasonable to ask to be allowed to remain with the Coldstream Guards in order to better understand the situation and see them redeploy within the city. But Squadron Leader Darren Moss, the Press Information Centre director at the divisional headquarters, explained that the presence already of a small group of trade and defence journalists in the divisional area would probably negate any ability to cope with our additional presence. Later he told us that the MoD had refused our request and that we should leave. Once we were back in Baghdad the MoD denied ordering our ejection and put the blame for it on the media operations officers in Basra. It is still unclear whose decision it was. Whoever it was, the outcome was that the only independent British journalists were removed from Basra. âSoldiers on the ground always used to be confident enough to know what they could say to journalists,â a captain remarked shortly before we left. âWith the control on information, now for the first time we see them turn round and ask their officers, âWhat am I supposed to say sir?â. â MIXED MESSAGES |
| Posted by:G. |