White House says Newsweek apology is insufficient
Newsweek magazine has apologised to readers for errors in a story alleging US interrogators at Guantanamo Bay desecrated the Quran. The accusations, which the magazine vowed to re-examine, spawned protests in Afghanistan that left 15 dead and scores injured.
Responding to harsh criticism from Muslim leaders worldwide, the Pentagon promised to investigate the charges and blamed “irresponsible” reporting by Newsweek for the deadly clashes.
“We regret that we got any part of our story wrong, and extend our sympathies to victims of the violence and to the US soldiers caught in its midst,” Editor Mark Whitaker wrote in the apology.
The White House said today that Newsweek’s response was insufficient.
“It’s puzzling. While Newsweek now acknowledges that they got the facts wrong, they refuse to retract the story,” said presidential spokesman Scott McClellan. “I think there’s a certain journalistic standard that should be met. In this instance it was not.
“This was a report based on a single anonymous source that could not substantiate the allegation that was made,” McClellan added. “The report has had serious consequences. People have lost their lives. The image of the United States abroad has been damaged. I just find it puzzling.”
In its issue dated May 9, Newsweek had reported that US military investigators had found evidence that interrogators placed copies of Islam’s holy book in washrooms and had flushed one down the toilet to get inmates to talk.
Whitaker wrote that the magazine’s information came from ”a knowledgeable US government source,” and writers Michael Isikoff and John Barry had sought comment from two Defence Department officials. One declined to respond, and the other challenged another part of the story but did not dispute the Quran charge, Whitaker said.
But on Friday, a top Pentagon spokesman told the magazine that a review of the military’s investigation concluded ”it was never meant to look into charges of Quran desecration. The spokesman also said the Pentagon had investigated other desecration charges by detainees and found them ’not credible.”’
Whitaker added that the magazine’s original source later said he could not be sure he read about the alleged Quran incident in the report Newsweek cited, and that it might have been in another document.
“Top administration officials have promised to continue looking into the charges, and so will we,” Whitaker wrote.
Newsweek Washington Bureau Chief Daniel Klaidman said the magazine believes it erred in reporting the allegation that a prison guard tried to flush the Quran down a toilet and that military investigators had confirmed the accusation.
“The issue here is to get the truth out, to acknowledge as quickly as possible what happened, and that’s what we’re trying to do,” Klaidman said.
Many of the 520 inmates at Guantanamo are Muslims arrested during the US-led war against the Taliban and its al Qaida allies in Afghanistan.
In a statement, Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman said the original story was “demonstrably false” and ”irresponsible,” and “had significant consequences that reverberated throughout Muslim communities around the world.”
“Newsweek hid behind anonymous sources, which by their own admission do not withstand scrutiny,” Whitman said. ”Unfortunately, they cannot retract the damage they have done to this nation or those that were viciously attacked by those false allegations.”
After Newsweek published the story, demonstrations spread across Afghanistan and Muslims around the world decried the alleged desecration.
In Afghanistan, Islamic scholars and tribal elders called for the punishment of anyone found to have abused the Quran, said Maulawi Abdul Wali Arshad, head of the religious affairs department in Badakhshan province.
Arshad and the provincial police chief said the scholars met in Faizabad, 310 miles north-east of the capital, Kabul, and demanded a “reaction” from US authorities within three days.
Lebanon’s most senior Shiite Muslim cleric said yesterday the reported desecration of the Quran is part of an American campaign aimed at disrespecting and smearing Islam.
Grand Ayatollah Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah called the alleged desecration a “brutal” form of torture and urged Muslims and international human rights organisations “to raise their voices loudly against the American behaviour.”
On Saturday, Pakistan’s President Gen Pervez Musharraf and Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz, both allies of Washington, demanded an investigation and punishment for those behind the reported desecration of the Quran.
The story also sparked protests in Pakistan, Yemen and the Gaza Strip. The 22-nation Arab League issued a statement saying if the allegations turned out to be true, Washington should apologise to Muslims.
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