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Article: In Iraq, everyone is media-savvy.(Iraq War 2003, war coverage)
- Article from:
- Columbia Journalism Review
- Article date:
- May 1, 2003
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2003 Columbia University, Graduate School of Journalism. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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This tale begins in early February in the mountains of northeastern Iraq, a few days after Secretary of State Colin Powell showed the UN Security Council--and the world--a satellite photo of what he said was a poison factory operated by Ansar al Islam, a militant band of Islamic fighters with ties to al Qaeda.
A few of us journalists wanted to see the factory for ourselves. After a morning of negotiation, Ansar agreed to take us past their checkpoints and into the hostile terrain within the folds of the Zagros Mountains. The leaders said they wanted to show us, as representatives of the world media, that they were not manufacturing chemical weapons. It struck me ...