Secrecy

Thanks for the Photo

Bill Mitchell, whose son was a U.S. Army soldier killed in Iraq earlier this month, has written a letter to The Seattle Times thanking the newspaper for publishing the picture of flag-draped caskets that broke a Pentagon ban. Mitchell believes his son was in one of the caskets shown in the now-famous photo by Tami Silicio. "Hiding the death and destruction of this war does not make it easier on anyone except those who want to keep the truth away from the people," he wrote.

Fired for a Photo

Tami Silicio, a Kuwait-based cargo worker whose photograph of flag-draped coffins of fallen U.S. soldiers was published in Sunday's edition of The Seattle Times, has been fired along with her husband.

The Sounds of Silence

"Americans seeking to know what President Bush said in his phone conversation with Russian President Vladimir Putin earlier this month went to the obvious place: the Kremlin," writes Dana Milbank. "It may come as a surprise to some that the Kremlin, symbol of secrecy and repression, has become more transparent that the White House, symbol of freedom and democracy...

Flag-Draped Coffins

"Last week, photos of flag-draped coffins in Kuwait containing the bodies of Americans killed in Iraq surfaced on scattered Internet sites, such as the Drudge Report," reports Charles Geraci. "The photos were not credited and no major news organization would touch them. But Sunday, a similar image appeared on the front page of The Seattle Times. The picture arrived amid rising debate over the Bush administration's strict ban on media outlets taking photos of soldiers' coffins offloaded at U.S. military bases."

Open the Government

A new coalition has formed to fight the expansion of government secrecy at all levels of government in the United States. "Open the Government" which bring together groups from the worlds of journalism, organized labor, the environmental movement and others interested in open government.

A Cost-Cost Analysis

"In a report analyzing the economics of protecting a threatened fish in the Pacific Northwest, the Bush administration this month deleted all references to possible monetary benefits" from conservation. The U.S.

Vanunu Moves from Prison to House Arrest

Nuclear whistleblower Mordechai Vanunu is scheduled to be released soon from prison after serving an 18-year sentence for blowing the whistle on Israel's weapons of mass destruction. However, Israel is also forbidding him from communicating with foreigners or moving about without permission and has been told that any infraction of these rules will land him back in prison without trial.

The Battle for Hearts and Minds

"Impartial information is increasingly hard to come by in Iraq," reports Fiona O'Brien. "As fighting has intensified on the ground, U.S. authorities have stepped up a separate battle for public opinion, tightly controlling the flow of information to journalists whose ability to move freely in Iraq has been limited by increasing danger." Although U.S. military officials refuse to discuss Iraqi civilian casualties, other reports suggest that hundreds have died in the past week in Fallujah alone.

The Jefferson Muzzles

The Thomas Jefferson Center for the Protection of Free Expression chooses April 13, the anniversary of Jefferson's birth, to issue its annual "Jefferson Muzzles" award to call attention to "those who in the past year forgot or disregarded Mr.

Gagging Sir David

Ivan Rogers, the principal private secretary to British Prime Minister Tony Blair, "tried to muzzle the Government's top scientific adviser after he warned that global warming was a more serious threat than international terrorism," report Steve Connor and Andrew Grice.

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