Project Censored: WW story on Kosovo mines chosen for journalism award
By John Catalinotto
April 13, 2000--Project Censored has chosen a story first published in Workers World on the mine riches of the Serbian province of Kosovo as one of the most important stories suppressed in 1999.
The story actually first broke in Workers World newspaper in 1998. It was reprinted a year later in the publication "Because People Matter."
Sara Flounders, co-director of the International Action Center and a frequent contributor to Workers World newspaper, wrote an article in the July 30, 1998, issue about how the Trepca mines and refineries, worth $5 billion, were targets of the appetites of big business in the major NATO countries. Flounders' article was entitled, "It's about the mines."
Her article--together with one by Diana Johnstone on "The role of Caspian Sea oil in the Balkan conflict," printed in Women Against Military Madness, and one by Pratap Chatterjee on "Caspian pipe dreams" in the San Francisco Bay Guardian--was named as the sixth most important censored story of the year.
Project Censored states its purpose is to explore and publicize the extent of censorship in U.S. society "by locating stories about significant issues of which the public should be aware, but is not, for one reason or another. Thereby, the project hopes to stimulate responsible journalists to provide more mass media coverage of those issues and to encourage the general public to demand mass media coverage of those issues or to seek information from other sources."
The top story was about how "multinational corporations profit from international brutality." Coming in second was a story on how "pharmaceutical companies put profits before need."
Two of the top 10 stories have to do with the U.S./NATO war against Yugoslavia and two others involve reports on U.S. militarism or armaments.
Project Censored named 25 most important censored articles of the year in all. The authors of the top 10 censored stories will appear at the April 12 awards ceremonies at the Fordham University Law Building on West 62nd Street between Amsterdam and Columbus Avenues in Manhattan. The event begins at 7 p.m.
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