KUNA chairman condones more coop. among world news agencies

LONDON, May 19 (KUNA) -- Sheikh Mubarak Al-Duaij Al-Ibrahim Al-Sabah, Head of the Federation of Arab News Agencies (FANA) as well as Chairman and Director General of Kuwait News Agency (KUNA), called on Thursday for more cooperation among international news agencies given current challenges in the field of dissemination of news.
Addressing a joint meeting of Arab news agencies and Reuters news agency, KUNA's chairman listed a number of these challenges, among them putting up with unjustified competition from questionable news sources that put out outright fallacies or at best unfounded rumors.
That fact, he said, puts the onus on legitimate news agencies to correct these fallacies and rumors, taking much time and effort to do so, and steering attention from worthier news stories.
Further, he decried the practice among some news agencies of issuing news stories taken from other sources without citing the latter as the true origins.
He also cautioned against news agencies that seek to mar and distort the image of Arabs and Muslims by branding them as terrorists and associating insidiously the religion of Islam with the scourge of terrorism.
In that regard, he said "Arabs and Muslims bear the major brunt of terrorism in the world more than others although the common wisdom is that terrorism is not confined to a specific religion, race, or national origin." Consequently, he said it was untoward to use only Arabic or Islamic names for terrorist groups, such as the so-called Islamic State (IS), because it unwittingly embeds in the minds of people of the world the dubious association between Islam, Muslims, and terrorism.
On the subject of IS, he said "Adherents of IS, in their practice of brutality, savagery, and cruelty, put a vast distance between themselves and the magnanimous and tolerant teachings of Islam," adding that what binds these adherents is nothing more than "the love of money, of shedding blood, and of spreading death and destruction everywhere they go." He called on all news agencies to work closely together in standing up against terrorism, zealotry, extremism, and racism.
Moreover, KUNA's chairman urged international news agencies to seek credible news stories from official sources to ensure maximum truthfulness and acceptability by the readers or viewers or listeners, whichever the case may be.
On a different note, he touted the long cooperation between Arab news agencies and Reuters, noting that large numbers of Arab and Muslim journalists work for Reuters, be that in regional or international locations. (end) khd.ajs