"We're talking to the owners of these stations and asking for some balance," Wolfowitz

DUBAI, July 28 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) - Two Arabic-language satellite channels Monday, July 28, vehemently rejected "slanderous" accusations by Washington of being unbalanced in their coverage of the situation in Iraq, accusing the U.S.-led forces of wanting to control all media.

U.S. Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul "Wolfowitz's words are pure slander against Arab media in general and Al-Arabiya and Al-Jazeera in particular," Al-Arabiya spokesman Saleh al-Qallab told Agence France-Presse (AFP) reported.

Qallab was referring to an interview Wolfowitz gave to Fox News Sunday, July 27, in which he accused Arabic-language news reports about Iraq of inciting violence against U.S. troops, pointing a finger in particular at the Qatar-based Al-Jazeera and Dubai-based Al-Arabiya television networks.

Wolfowitz, a pro-war hawk, cited what he insisted was a "false report" by Al-Jazeera that U.S. forces arrested an imam in Iraq, when in fact, according to Wolfowitz, no such arrest had occurred.

"We're talking to the owners of these stations and asking for some balance," Wolfowitz said.

"So far, I think the answer we're getting is that those broadcasts are continuing and that's not satisfactory."

"What I'm complaining of are false reporting and very biased reporting that has the effect of inciting violence against our troops, and these governments should stop and realize that this is not a game, that they are endangering the lives of American troops," he said.

Qallab retorted that "Wolfowitz must not expect Al-Arabiya to consider U.S. troops as a liberating force. They are an occupying force with no U.N. resolution.

"During the war in Iraq, Al-Arabiya always sided with the truth: neither with Saddam Hussein nor with the U.S. occupying forces.

But Qallab said "We sometimes make a mistake, but generally we made sure to be precise and neutral during the war," Qallab said of the privately-financed station launched earlier this year.

'Unacceptable'

Al-Arabiya is in competition with Al-Jazeera, which has emerged as a rival to international media giants, notably after its ground-breaking coverage of the Afghan conflict, even though its no-holds-barred coverage has also sparked rows between Qatar and other Arab governments.

"The problem is that western media were not expecting to find large Arab competitors who found success thanks to their respect of the truth, something that doesn't please some people," said Al-Jazeera manager Adnan al-Sharif.

Sharif defended the "credibility of Al-Jazeera, which doesn't broadcast any news without first trying to ask the Americans."

The network's Baghdad correspondent, Yasser Abu Hilala, did not mince his words while blasting Wolfowitz's comments in a live broadcast Monday.

"It's simple: the U.S. forces want the media to be in their service. That is unacceptable, even in the Third World.

"Any self-respecting media refuses to submit to the wish of the government and even less so when this government is an occupier," Abu Hilala said.

"It's obvious Al-Jazeera is on the carpet and the victim of slander," the correspondent said, adding that the Americans could have been misled by a "mistranslation" of the network's news.

Al-Jazeera said Monday one of its cameramen, Nawfal al-Shahwani, arrested by U.S. troops in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul as he filmed an attack on American soldiers, had been released.

"Our colleague was released overnight but they (the U.S. soldiers) confiscated the tape he'd made," Abu Halala said.

Relations between Washington and al-Jazeera had further stained in the Afghan war, in which the Arab broadcaster's office was hit in November 2001.

On April 8, U.S. missiles hit the Baghdad offices of the channel's bureau, killing and wounding two staff in what the Qatar-based Arabic news network charged was a deliberate strike.

The U.S. forces also attacked a hotel only hosted by reporters shortly afterwards, leaving five people, including a Spanish cameraman and three staff of British news agency Reuters, wounded.

Also, Hackers who many believe may be connected to the Pentagon, have already hacked the Doha-based Al-Jazeera’s newly-minted English language website.

The United States had protested against a report by al-Jazeera in which bodies of U.S. soldiers killed during the March invasion were shown. U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld called the broadcast an act against the Geneva Conventions.

Aljazeera wondered how explicitly Washington allowed TV stations to film bodies of former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein's two sons with graphically-depicted fatal wounds last week while protesting its own filming of the dead bodies.