An influential Egyptian TV talk show host has suspended his broadcasts in protest at media censorship.
Yosri Fouda, host of the Last Word on the private satellite channel ONTV, said there had been "a noticeable deterioration in media freedoms."
Fouda, speaking amid rising journalistic discontent about the ruling military's media policy, said the deterioration was "accompanied by a noticeable laxity towards the media's bathos (triviality)."
He wrote on his Facebook page:
"The deterioration and laxity spring from a belief held by those in authority that the media can deny an existing reality or fabricate a reality that does not exist."
He would therefore be "indefinitely suspending" his show, which has hosted senior military commanders as well as activists who oppose the ruling generals.
Fouda is a former London bureau chief for the Al-Jazeera news channel.
The military, which has inveighed against what it calls sensationalist journalism, has denied that it censors the media.
It also defended controversial coverage by the state broadcaster, ERTU, of aclash between soldiers and Christians earlier this month in which 25 people died.
As reported here last week, the European Broadcasting Union has criticised ERTU for biased coverage.
Source: AFP
Original Page: http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/greenslade/2011/oct/24/egypt-press-freedom