| Interesting article. Syria's got next to no window for the rest of the world to look in. Their news agency's next to unreadable and there's no foreign language press that I've seen. It'll be intersting to see if things actually loosen up. |
When Mehdi Dakhlallah wrote an article earlier in the year calling for the abolition of a clause in the Syrian constitution granting preferential treatment to the ruling Baath party, many thought he would lose his job as editor of Al-Baath newspaper. After all, Syrian Vice-President Abdel-Halim Khaddam responded that the constitutional clause, Article 8, was "holy" and could not be touched. However, instead of being sacked, Dakhlallah was promoted to minister of information and since then has launched an accelerated shake-up of Syria's media.Journalists are growing bolder as traditional red lines blur, taboos are broken and fear of imprisonment for writing articles critical of the regime recedes. "This is new, this is very new," said Ziad Haydar, Damascus correspondent of the Al-Arabiyya Arabic satellite channel and Lebanon's As-Safir newspaper.
Dakhlallah's impact on media reforms was illustrated last month with the publication of an article containing unprecedented criticism of the Syrian intelligence services. The article, written by independent journalist Hakam Baba was due to be published in Lebanon's An Nahar newspaper - the more liberal Lebanese press is traditionally favored by Syrian writers who face censure in Syria. But even though Baba also attacked Dakhlallah in his article, the minister gave his approval for its publication in the Tishreen daily. "I think Dakhlallah wanted it published in Syria because it would have more impact here," Baba said.