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NEWS ... GLOBAL NEWS ... UK GOVT ADMITS MI6 PLANTED alleged propaganda effort when first tion of DirecTV will give News STORIES ON IRAQI WMD approached by MI6's station chief in New Corporation even more bargaining clout alleged propaganda effort when first approached by MI6's station chief in New York. He obtained approval to cooperate from Richard Butler, then Executive Chairman of the UN Special Commission on Iraq Disarmament. (Source: The Times, UK, posted 29 December 2003 at http:/www.thepeninsu - laqatar.com/Display_news.asp ?section= World_News &subsection=United+Kingdo m+ %26+Europe&month=December2003 &file=World_News2003122921734.xml) tion of DirecTV will give News Corporation even more bargaining clout when it negotiates retransmission fees with cable and satellite competitors. Even the FCC recognised this could be a problem. Ever wonder how Rupert Murdoch usu- ally gets what he wants? News Corp. spent nearly US$10 million on lobbying from 1999 to 2002. Murdoch himself has met personally with FCC commissioners and key lawmakers several times. For the 2004 election, News Corp. has already contributed $200,000. For the 2000 and 2002 cycles, the company's contributions exceeded $1.7 million. (Source: The Progress Report, 25 December 2003, http://truthout.org/ docs_03/122503E.shtml) he British government has confirmed that MI6 had organised Operation Mass Appeal, a campaign to plant stories in the media about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. A senior official admitted that MI6 had been at the heart of a campaign launched in the late 1990s to spread information about Saddam's development of nerve agents and other weapons, but denied that it had planted misinformation. The admission followed claims by Scott Ritter, who led 14 inspection missions in Iraq, that MI6 had recruited him in 1997 to help with the propaganda effort. He described meetings where the senior offi- cer and at least two other MI6 staff had discussed ways to manipulate intelligence material. "The aim was to convince the public that Iraq was a far greater threat than it actually was," Ritter said. He said there was evidence that MI6 continued to use similar propaganda tactics up to the invasion of Iraq earlier in 2003. "Stories ran in the media about secret underground facilities in Iraq and ongoing programs [to produce weapons of mass destruction]," said Ritter. "They were sourced to Western intelligence and all of them were garbage." Kelly, himself a former United Nations weapons inspector and colleague of Ritter, may also have been used by MI6 to pass information to the media. "Kelly was a known and government- approved conduit with the media," said Ritter. Lord Hutton's report is expected to deliver a verdict in January on whether intelligence was misused in order to pro- mote the case for going to war. Lord Hutton heard evidence that Kelly was authorised by the Foreign Office to speak to journalists on Iraq. Kelly was in close touch with the "Rockingham cell", a group of weapons experts that received MIO intelligence. The campaign was judged to be having a successful effect on public opinion. Poland, India and South Africa were ini- tially chosen as targets for the campaign because they were non-aligned UN coun- tries not supporting the British and US position on sanctions. At the time, in 1997, Poland was also a member of the UN Security Council. Ritter was a willing accomplice to the FCC APPROVES MURDOCH'S 2002 cycles, the company’ s contributions MEDIA MEGA-MERGER exceeded $1.7 million. [i a devastating blow for media diversity, (Source: The Progress Report, 25 the US Federal Communications December 2003, http://truthout.org/ Commission (FCC) on 19 December, on a —docs_03/122503E. shtml) contentious 3 to 2 vote, approved a "$6.6 billion media mega-merger" between SADDAM HUSSEIN CAPTURED DirecTV satellite television service and FIRST BY KURDISH FORCES Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation. S: am Hussein was found by US The merger will add DirecTV's 11 mil- troops only after he had been taken lion subscribers to Murdoch's US empire, _ prisoner by Kurdish forces, drugged and which already includes local television sta- | abandoned ready for American soldiers to tions reaching more than 44 per cent of the —_ recover him. country, a major national broadcast net- Saddam Hussein came into the hands of work, numerous cable and satellite chan- the Kurdish Patriotic Front after being nels, the most widely used electronic pro- _ betrayed to the group by a member of the gram guide, newspapers, magazines, a _al-Jabour tribe, whose daughter had been publishing house and movie studios. raped by Saddam's son Uday, leading to a The unprecedented size and scope of _ blood feud, according to the UK Sunday Murdoch's holding will, according to FCC —_ Express, which quoted an unnamed senior Commissioner Jonathan A. Adelstein, put —_ British military intelligence officer. N e wi os Corporation "in ] a position to rg raise program- i ae