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SRI LANKA NEEDS LAWS TO CURB PUBLICATION OF "CLASSIFIED INFORMATION" - THAT DOES NOT MEAN SRI LANKA IS VIOLATING MEDIA FREEDOM OR FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION/PUBLICATION.

Noor Nizam Lecturer in Communication Science Hamilton. Canada.

The statement made to Lankadeepa Newspapers by Secretary of Defense Gotabhaya Rajapaksha explains the reality of Media Freedom and Right of Journalism in a ethnic war ridden country like Sri Lanka.

Let all citizens and forces respecting "Democracy" become "REAL".
Did not the Secretary of Defense tell the truth and nothing but the truth to the people and the International Community. There is sense in what the Secretary of defense is stating.

"I think that there is no need to report anything on the military. People do not want to know how many and what kind of arms we acquired. That is not media freedom. I say without fear that if I have the power I will not allow any of these things to be written. I told the President that we need to exercise press censorship from the beginning. I have been telling him that we need bring in laws that stipulate harsh punishments for such reporting."
. . We need a criminal defamation law . . . This is not media freedom, although very few are doing this.

Maybe the forces that are the advocacy groups for freedom of expression and media freedom have not understood what the defense Secretary had meant. Military information including sensitive information should be "CLASSIFIED". Sri Lanka does not have legislative enactments or regulations to govern this. Therefore the Secretary Defense is very correct to express his opinion in openly stating that media has to be censored and that criminal punishment of defamation should be brought back.

All democratically elected countries including the G8 countries, North American Nations, European Nations, Scandinavia and Nordic countries (for that matter almost all UN member nations) have publication laws governing "CLASSIFIED INFORMATION". This does not mean that all these countries are violating Media Freedom of Freedom of Expression/Publication.

I agree with the concerns of the advocacy groups like the FMM and other break-away groups of FMM, but the Secretary Defense is not calling for "censoring" any newspapers, rather on the contrary he has specifically stated that certain sensitive military and security information should not be published.
Naturally, if there is no respect for this from Media Companies and Journalists, with due respect to the issue, then there is all the reason to understand the stand taken by Secretary of Defense Mr. Gotabhaya Rajapaksha to influence the President (his brother) to enact laws that are needed to arrest the publication of "CLASSIFIED INFORMATION" which the Secretary Defense has really wanted not to be published. It is a very fair democratic approach he has taken, under the given circumstances. I myself do not wish Media censorship at all. But lets get "REAL" after all. Even publishing photographs and family details background information about victims, blown-up images and dead bodies of individuals, pictures of militants (specially child soldiers) and soldiers, calling them names in the press and showing/giving details of there where abouts and identities of their families can be construed as a violation of their PRIVACY. Only the authorities and those who have the legitimate right to have access to such information should have "privy" to have those information. We do not have even such "PRIVACY" laws in Sri Lankan to govern such outright violation of Human and Fundamental Rights in Sri Lanka by the Media and Press.

The Secretary Defense Mr. Gotabhaya Rajapaksha as a responsible government official is very correct to make his stand on the issue.

Noor Nizam
Lecturer in Communication Science
Hamilton.
Canada.

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