BEIRUT - A TV channel controlled by the Lebanese Shiite movement Hezbollah on Friday condemned a decision taken at a meeting of EU national regulators to ban its broadcasting in Europe as an "aggression" on press freedom.
"The decision taken by EU censorship officials to ban the Al-Manar TV channel from broadcasting via European satellites is not based on a legal warrant and violates the simplest legal principles," the management of the channel said in a statement released here.
It said the move, approved in Brussels Thursday, "represents a flagrant aggression against the freedom of (the) press and contradicts the simplest principles of the human rights charter and the principles that Europe claims to promote."
Regulators from the 25-member European Union agreed Thursday to coordinate efforts against broadcasts deemed to incite racial hatred in Europe.
Dutch officials at the meeting, called by the EU executive commission, said that in light of the EU initiative, the Dutch group New Skies Satellites would not be authorized to carry Al-Manar broadcasts starting Monday.
"This means that reception of Al-Manar will no longer be possible in most of the European Union," a commission spokesman said.
An administrative court in France last December ordered the Paris-based Eutelsat satellite company to halt Al-Manar broadcasts on grounds that they were spreading anti-Semitic propaganda.
The Al-Manar statement here charged that Thursday's move was part of "a massive Israeli campaign" and was aimed at "besieging the channel worldwide."
"The channel will use every means to transmit its informative message to its viewers in order to inform them about the facts, particularly the crises that our Arab and Islamic worlds are facing."
03/18/2005 15:35 GMT