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4 June 2012 | AP

NKorea threatens specific attacks on SKorean media

North Korea's military warned Monday that troops have aimed artillery at the specific coordinates of South Korean media groups as Pyongyang threatened a "merciless sacred war" over perceived insults. The North Korean statement, which expresses outrage over South Korean media criticism of ongoing children's festivals in Pyongyang, is the latest in a series of threats aimed at Seoul's conservative government and news agencies following the December death of Kim Jong Il, the father of new leader Kim Jong Un. North Korea hasn't yet acted on its threats of violence. Still, Monday's comments from the General Staff of the Korean People's Army contained an unusually specific mention of the longitude and latitude of the locations of seven media outlets. North Korea said it had targeted those agencies and would attack if Seoul doesn't apologize for orchestrating a "vicious smear campaign" against the festivals in the North's capital. In Seoul, the Unification Ministry, which handles relations with the North, called the statement a "grave provocation."

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4 June 2012 | AP

Israel media worried over looming indictment

The Israeli government's plans to indict an investigative reporter who exposed classified military practices for killing wanted Palestinian militants has sent a chill over Israel's aggressive media and evoked dark warnings of a crusade to muzzle the press. Israeli journalists have repeatedly accused Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of trying to stifle the press since he took office three years ago. Critics say the planned indictment of Uri Blau from the liberal Haaretz newspaper goes even further by undercutting the essence of journalism: keeping citizens informed of what their government is up to. The government replies that despite his insistence that he was just doing his job, the journalist was holding classified documents illegally and will be charged. Dozens of Israeli journalists demonstrated Sunday against the planned indictment outside the Justice Ministry in Jerusalem. Officials say formal charges are expected within weeks. Blau could face up to seven years in prison for possessing sensitive military documents without proper authorizations, despite returning the material to the army. Legal experts predict it is highly unlikely Blau will ever end up behind bars, saying the state will probably seek a plea bargain instead.

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4 June 2012 | AFP

Myanmar censor to put down his black marker for good

The tormentor-in-chief of Myanmar's heavily censored media will put down his black marker pen for good in a month, signalling the end of one of the world's most draconian press scrutiny regimes. Tint Swe, head of the Press Scrutiny and Registration Department (PSRD), said he will release its iron grip on the country's media in the latest significant reform for a country emerging from decades of repression. "There will be no press scrutiny job from the end of June. There will be no monitoring of local journals and magazines," he told AFP in an interview in his office in Yangon. Stifling pre-publication censorship - applied in the past to everything from newspapers to fairy tales and the winning lottery numbers - was one of the key symbols of junta-ruled Myanmar, where even seemingly innocuous details were scrubbed from public discussion. Sweeping reforms under a new quasi-civilian government have seen a lighter touch from the once ubiquitous censors, with less controversial publications freed from scrutiny last year. Editors across the news media are now eager to have the same freedom. A more open climate has seen private weekly news publications publish an increasingly bold range of stories, including those about opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi, whose very name was taboo in the past. Tint Swe directed the PSRD for seven years, mercilessly changing headlines, slashing paragraphs or scrapping entire articles deemed critical of the military and its cronies.

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4 June 2012 | Asian-Pacific Broadcasting Union

Saudi TV and Radio to split from press agency

The Saudi Television and Radio and the Saudi Press Agency (SPA) are to separate into two organisations, the Kingdom’s Council of Ministers has decreed. According to iina.me, the two corporations will be empowered to take independent decisions and will operate with distinct budgets, Saudi Arabia's Culture and Information Minister Abdul Aziz Khoja told Arab News. "The new structure will enable Saudi TV and Radio and SPA to work efficiently without bureaucratic hurdles. The new corporations would have the power to appoint reporters and cope with new developments in order to provide the best possible services to the public and their clients," the Minister is quoted as saying. Saudi Television and Radio will carry the Kingdom's message to all corners of the Gulf country and to other parts of the world, making use of modern technology, the minister added, while the SPA will cover events and issues at national, regional and international levels and help strengthen the journalism in the country. The rules and regulations for the two new entities will reportedly be completed within six months.

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4 June 2012 | RTE.ie

China censors internet searches and references to Tiananmen Massacre

China's censors blocked internet access to the terms related to the Tiananmen Square Massacre ahead of its anniversary Monday. "Six four", "23", "candle" and "never forget" were blocked, increasing extensive efforts to silence talk about the 23rd anniversary of China's bloody 4 June crackdown on pro-democracy protesters. For China's ruling Communist Party, the 1989 demonstrations that clogged Tiananmen Square in Beijing and spread to other cities remains taboo. Searches for the terms related to the anniversary, such as "six four" for 4 June, were blocked on Sina Weibo, the most popular of China's Twitter-like microblogging platforms. Users encountered a message that said the search results could not be displayed "due to relevant laws, regulations and policies". The anniversary of the date on which troops shot their way into central Beijing in 1989 has never been publicly marked in mainland China. Microbloggers decried the overzealous rash of censorship, complaining that their posts had been "harmonised" - a euphemism for censorship - within minutes. Censors also prevented microbloggers from changing their display photos in an apparent attempt to prevent them from posting any photo commemorating the anniversary. Yet some people did manage to beat the censors, and a few pictures of the 1989 protests did find their way on to Weibo.

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4 June 2012 | V3.co.uk

US identified as Stuxnet perpetrator with Obama’s backing

The infamous Stuxnet worm, which crippled Iranian nuclear enrichment facilities, was part of a wider cyberwar campaign orchestrated by the Whitehouse under direct command of president Obama, it has been claimed. The New York Times has run in-depth article which cites numerous unidentified sources, who claim to have knowledge of a covert operation, known as Olympic Games, which sought to unleash cyber havoc on Iran. Those security researchers that have studied Stuxnet have long suggested its complexity was such that it could only have been authored by well-funded state security programme. That being the case, the most likely candidates – given the target – were the US and Israel. But the NYT reports suggests Stuxnet was part of a much wider cyber war programme, initiated under president Bush and extended by president Obama. The NYT report is based the forthcoming book by David Sanger, Confront and Conceal: Obama's Secret War and Surprising Use of AmericanPower. The revelations come just days after yet another complex piece of malware has been found infecting systems in the Middle East. The so-called Flame toolkit is also believed to have been developed by state services with Israel already hinting it may have been involved. These latest revelations suggest the US could well be behind that too.

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