Association of Canadian Editorial Cartoonists Blog
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June 16th, 2006
Press Release
Country/Topic: Iran
Country Date: 16 June 2006
Country Source: Cartoonists Rights Network Canada (CRNC) and Iranian Students News Agency (ISNA)
Person(s): Mana Neyestani & Mehrdad Qassemfar
Target(s): Tehran daily "Iran's" cartoonist and editor-in-chief
Type(s) of violation(s): imprisonment
Urgency: top priority
(CRNC/ISNA)- Cartoonist Mana Neyestani and his editor-in-chief Mehrdad Qassemfar will be tried in the Islamic Revolutionary Court for inciting ethnic unrest. A Neyestani cartoon triggered protests and violence among the Turkish-speaking population in northwestern parts of Iran after appearing in a weekly supplement "Iran Jomeh." The Islamic Revolutionary Court usually doesn't deal with cases of this nature, and normally deals with major crimes such as disrupting the national economy, jeopardizing national security and large-scale drug and human trafficking. On June 12th, 2006, the Iranian minister of Justice announced that the judiciary had asked the court to punish the accused with "highest penalty" available. He said that the criminal action taken by Neyetsani is not related to the press laws and only the Revolutionary Court is authorized to try the case. The hearings are usually not open to the public and are held behind closed doors. There will not be a jury. A judge alone will rule against the accused. Mana Neyastani has been held in custody from May 23rd in the Evin prison and has been interrogated several times. The Neystani family has also faced death threats from the Azeri Minority. --30-- _________________________________________ Mana Neyestani Links _________________________________________________________ May 31st, 2006 Political Satire in Britain _____________________________________________________________________ May 30th, 2006 ACEC Poll Result The ACEC Poll to gauge opinion of whether we should aid the Western Standard was close, but the "no" camp did win. Ezra Levant told me when he was in Halifax a couple weeks past that the Western Standard's campaign to raise funds is an overwhelming success, and I don't think he was spinning me. I think they raked in the cash. Not only that, new subscriptions were up by more than a thousand. If running the Danish cartoons wasn't a PR stunt (yeah, um, right), the Western Standard is none the less reaping a huge windfall. There's no business like show business, and there's no readership like the christian right readership.
_____________________________________________________________________ May 29th, 2006 NNAs
Editorial Cartooning: Winner - Brian Gable, The Globe and Mail. Runners-up - Serge Chapleau, La Presse, Montreal; Bruce MacKinnon, Halifax Chronicle-Herald. _____________________________________________________________________ Mini-ACEC Convention Following the NNA awards ceremony, which took place is Halifax this year, Brian Gable, Bruce MacKinnon, Serge Chapleau and Michael de Adder (myself) went to Stayner's Wharf Pub to celebrate Gable's win. _____________________________________________________________________ Luckovich Continues To Win
_____________________________________________________________________ Note from Nick I got a note from Nikohang Kowsar saying that the encoding on my computer must not have been able to read Persian script, because the wording came out looking like this (Í«œœ«‘ Á«? ÊÍ?¬ÁÊ)...
His web page should look like this, proper Persian lettering...
(ACEC lesson of the day: Persian script doesn't look like you dropped your coffee mug on your keyboard.) _____________________________________________________________________ May 24th, 2006 Blasphemy case filed against Danish cartoonists, editors Web posted at: 4/27/2006 7:42:8 Source ::: AFP KARACHI: Pakistani police have registered a blasphemy case against Danish cartoonists and some European newspapers over cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad (PBUH) that sparked worldwide protests this year, they said yesterday. Internet search engines Google.com and Yahoo.com were also named in the complaint filed by Iqbal Haider, an activist of a small political party, police said. The case has been registered under Pakistan’s blasphemy law which calls for the death penalty for defiling the Prophet (PBUH). “We registered the case late on Tuesday on the basis of the Supreme Court’s April 17 order,” local police officer Tariq Malik said. Police originally refused to register the case but Haider obtained an order from the Supreme Court last week. The complaint was formally registered at a Karachi police station against Danish cartoonists and editors and publishers of Danish, Irish, Norwegian, French and Italian newspapers for reproducing the cartoons. “I filed the petition in January 2006 and the Supreme Court ordered police to register the complaint. The case has been registered under the blasphemy law and under the anti-terrorist act,” Haider said. He said the court would now issue notices to the cartoonists, newspapers and websites through the Pakistani foreign ministry. The 12 cartoons by several artists were first published in Denmark’s Jyllands-Posten newspaper in September and subsequently reproduced elsewhere, mainly in Europe, triggering widespread demonstrations. Five people died in Pakistan during violent protests. Muslims consider images of the prophet as blasphemous. _____________________________________________________________________ May 18th, 2006 News
Blogging Is The New Revolution: ********************************************************************************* May 17th, 2006 Interviews
US satirist Art Spiegelman tackles Danish cartoons _____________________________________________________________________ Comments
Actually, I believe that Ezra Levant's case has nothing to do with defending "Human Rights" or "Freedom of Speech". It was a sort of confrontation, knowing the conclusions and results. It looks like he wanted to play the victim, and gain support. If it was something against Western Standard's political agenda even defending freedom of speech, would it have been published by Ezra Levant? I think publishing those cartoons after what had happened in Europe and Middle East was a cheap trick to catch more subscribers among the Christian Right. Doesn't this seem awkward that the "Western Standard" has it's own "Double Standards"? I say NO! - Nikahang Kowsar
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Cartoon Wars _________________________________________________________ News Free Expression and the Sacred: Should There Be Limits? _________________________________________________________ Comments Lewis Lapham, succinct as always, wrote a preface for a collection of caricatures for a fellow-cartoonist Steve Brodner three years ago. He wrote, "Satire is humor sent on a moral errand. Any ventures on the darker shores of satire presupposes readers well enough aware of their own hypocrisies..." With embassies and passions burning, what this Danish cartoon ignominy has done is to expose hypocrisies on all sides ˆ both Western and Muslim. Jyllands-Posten, the Danish newspaper that initially published the cartoons, commissioned the drawings after the author of a book said he was unable to find anyone prepared to provide images of the Prophet Mohammad. The cartoons that were submitted were drawn not using any clever use of satire but through sheer ignorance. These were bad cartoons published in the worst of times - a faulty pin, straining on the lid of a simmering pressure-cooker. The cartoons in question are awful examples of what is usually a sophisticated form of editorial humor. These cartoons are both vacuous and ignorant. Any editor would know that to directly link the founder of one of the world's leading monotheistic religions with terrorist violence - the clear implication of these cartoons - is erroneous. The reason editors give for publishing these cartoons was to guarantee the „Freedom of Expression‰. This could not be farther from the truth. Many European editors throw up a wall-of-condoning-silence when it comes to challenging their government policies regarding immigrant integration or how the United States is outsourcing torture on European soil. Speaking from personal experience, here in Canada, I have been called a Holocaust denier for depicting the heavy-handedness of Israel and have had my political-beliefs questioned for being too critical of the US lead Operation-Enduring-Freedom. The media have never been a true bastion of free speech; in fact the media has historically always been an association of incongruities. But this is a known fact. There is nothing new here, nor should it come as a surprise to anyone. Islamic extremism has hijacked a religion. There is an apathy and fear shown by the Muslim masses in the face of this radicalism. Personally, I have been threatened and my work censored by fearful Arab and Pakistani editors when I editorialize extremists. Many Muslim editors hide behind euphemisms and do not risk critical thought. On the global stage, a case in point was the wanton desecration of the Bamiyan Buddhas by the Taliban in 2001. There were no moderate demonstrations against Islamic fundamentalism when these statues were demolished. On the other-hand, there was no bloodshed or coercion by any Buddhist from anywhere in the world in response to these acts. Muslims need to actively contribute to peace and moderation. While right-wing groups stir-up Islamophobia in Europe the Muslim populations are stumbling in denial over the escalating role of their own extremists. Muslims need to be more at ease and informed about their faith. Nowhere in the Koran does it say to kill sacrilegious-cartoonists. Arguably, a simplistic reason for all this fervor is the depiction of the Prophet‚s face. So, what is a face to a caricaturist? For me drawing of a face is not necessarily about representing features. A caricature does not have to be facially accurate. It is not the real portrayal of a person; it is more of an impression of the subject. A caricaturist draws an unreal image, which convinces the viewer that this is how a person really looks however improbable. And here lays the problem - the cartoonist from Denmark and an Arab arsonist can only reflect on what they know. And what do they know? The Dane equates the Prophet with violence while the Arab has been inculcated to kill the Dane for depicting the Prophet. The world lies in a tenuous balance between secularism and faith; wealth and disparity; knowledge and ignorance; and last but not least between a Prophet and a cartoonist. - Shahid Mahmood **************************************************************************** May 16th, 2006 News Mohammed Cartoons Nixed In Cartoon Awards Gala Publication _________________________________________________________ Comments
I dropped a line to Brian after the issue of supporting Ezra Levant in this Human Rights case was first raised. I've been holding off posting anything till I had a chance to clear some hurdles, one of which was looking into the legal ramifications of this case, and the other was participating in a panel discussion on the issue along with Ezra Levant and the president of the Canadian Islamic Congress. I thought it might help to hear the opinions of those a bit more directly involved. On the legal issues, one of the chief points which precipitated this whole debate was Brian's legitimate concern that a loss in this Human Rights case could erode hard earned rights we have gained through previous cases such as the Bierman decision. That in itself seems unlikely, if not impossible in light of opinions I've received from one of the Herald's lawyers who specializes in media law. Even in the unlikely event that the plaintiff should win the case against the Western Standard, that decision would not be binding on a Human Rights board in another province, or on any higher court decision, provincial or federal. It would certainly not affect Vander Zalm v. Bierman. Human Rights boards are provincial bodies, the acts which guide them differ from province to province. Here in Nova Scotia, such an adjudicative board is lower in rank than any court, and would not be binding to a higher court. On top of that, Ezra Levant, who is himself a lawyer, made no secret of the fact that this case is extremely weak and the likelihood of it getting anywhere is remote at best. Everything I've read and been told by our legal eagles concurs. Still Mr. Levant seemed extremely pleased with all the donations he's received to date, not to mention the 1,000-plus new subscriptions his magazine has sold since he published the Danish cartoons. My personal take on the issue, as I explained it to Brian, was this: At first glance the Western Standard's publishing those cartoons, though completely fair game, struck me as a shallow and opportunistic abuse of free speech. To me, the 'long after the fact' re-publication of the cartoons in such a safe Christian right market as Alberta, where there was no risk of any real opposition (i.e. mass subscription cancellations, burning buildings etc), amounted to little more than belated piling on, something which I felt only served to fan the flames of religious hatred. I don't think it can be justified, the way the original publication in the Danish paper could, as original thought and a creative, if volatile, experiment on the issue of freedom of speech. Did he have the right to do it? Absolutely. I just think it was cowardly and irresponsible. This obviously isn't my decision to make. To some there may still be a symbolic purpose in backing this defence and I respect that, but if it were up to me alone, especially after what I saw and heard from Ezra Levant this weekend, there is no way I would ever be part of any effort to support this guy. I could elaborate but there isn't enough space on this blog. Anyone who wants to hear more, I can e-mail some highlights. You can definitely put this down as a "no" vote either way. - Bruce MacKinnon (Hfx. Herald. Ltd.)
_________________________________________________________ May 13th, 2006 Anti-semetic cartoons in the Middle East (PDF) How Can There Be Peace in the Middle East: A Study of Anti-Israel and Anti-Semitic Cartoons _________________________________________________________
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