A draft of Qatar New Media law
A draft of Qatar Media law was exclusively published yesterday in Alsharq local Daily newspaper. Peninsula Qatar Reports some highlights of the 45 article Law
http://www.thepeninsulaqatar.com/qatar/145284-draft-law-promises-freedom...
"Prima facie the draft appears to provide some freedom to journalists and says they cannot be detained for questioning by law-enforcement agencies—as is the case presently—without a court order.
According to the draft, journalists will have the right to protect their sources but would be required to disclose them if a court so demands.
There will be no censorship on the media, says the draft but there shall be a publications department and a communications division within the culture ministry which would be authorized to license the media.
It is understood that while the publications division would deal with the licensing of the print media, the communications wing would be the licensing body for the electronic media.
All Qatari journalists are to be appointed under the direct ‘supervision’ of the culture ministry, says the draft.
All expatriate journalists should be graduates in mass communication and must be accredited by a committee to be set up by the ministry for the purpose.
Citizens desirous of applying for media license would need to be at least 21 years of age and should have at least passed the secondary school"
The law has 6 articles on Electronic publishing, "Alsharq" highlighted that license will not be required from news websites, periodicals and e-newspapers.
As i highlighted in a previous thread, the main obstacle that journalists face here is that Here, anybody can simply file a complaint with the police against a reporter and his newspaper. The new Media law tackles this and secures that journalists would face no detention
In addition, the law shall allow the establishment of independent private media outlets through License.
Apart from that, there is not much in the law or it seems blurry. We can only know after the release of the 45- article Law.
I did predict in my previous thread that the law must be in the verge of being released soon
http://www.qatarliving.com/node/1668659
Local dailies seems to be pushing the envelope further lately & are being self critical
does it affect QL reporting?
Very vague and open to a great deal of interpretation by judges, but still an improvement.
when journalists will have the right to protect their sources but would be required to disclose them if a court so demands.