Wellington - Fiji's military regime, which was reappointed
last week after being declared illegal by the Court of Appeal,
expelled two foreign reporters Monday after banning all media
criticism under emergency regulations, reports from the capital Suva
said.
Veteran Australian radio reporter Sean Donery and New Zealand's
TV3 political reporter Sia Aston were ordered to leave the country
after reporting that military censors had forbidden local media from
criticising the government.
'Given the restrictions imposed on local media, I'm not surprised
that they don't want foreign journalists here telling the rest of the
world what you people aren't allowed to tell your own people,' Donery
said.
He had earlier reported that the country's leading newspaper, the
Fiji Times, carried no stories about the political situation in
Monday's edition.
The Fiji Times had been warned that if it continued to publish
empty pages or blank spaces indicating where military censors have
banned articles, it would be shut down and its publisher deported,
Donery reported, quoting sources in Fiji.
The Ministry of Information has sent letters to newspapers, radio
and television stations advising that all news stories published or
broadcast from now on should not carry any negativity, the
Fijivillage news website reported.
It quoted Attorney General Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum as saying that the
government headed by military strongman Voreqe Bainimarama wants all
media organizations in the country to publish or broadcast news that
is pro-Fiji.
Television Fiji, which was made to cut a planned item in
Saturday's news, did not screen its usual evening news bulletin on
Sunday in protest against the censors, who have been posted in every
media outlet's newsroom.
Bainimarama's regime has attacked the press since he ousted the
elected government in a bloodless coup in December 2006.
Two of The Fiji Times's Australian publishers have been deported
in the past 18 months, and in January the paper was fined for
publishing a letter critical of the High Court, while the editor,
Netani Rika, was given a suspended three-month prison sentence for
contempt of court.
The Australian publisher of another daily, The Fiji Sun, was also
deported last year.
A Fijian citizen in Suva, too afraid to be named, was quoted by
Wellington's Dominion Post as saying he feared being arrested, beaten
or killed for speaking out.
'There's no constitution, there's no law,' he said. 'They are the
law.'
The Court of Appeal ruled on Thursday that Bainimarama's
government was illegal, but President Ratu Josefa Iloilo then sacked
the judges, revoked the constitution, declared emergency powers and
reappointed Bainimarama and his cabinet for five years.
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