LEAKED VIDEO SHOWS EGYPTIAN MILITARY CHIEFS DISCUSSING MEDIA

An Arab-language video posted on YouTube showing Egyptian Army officers discussing ways of persuading the news media to engage in “self-censorship” to protect the military has raised new questions about the military coup that ousted President Mohamed Morsi on July 3. The video shows a roomfull of military officers addressing Gen. Abdul Fattah el-Sisi several months before the coup, in which they call news coverage of the military “dangerous” and urge a restoration of “red lines to protect the armed forces from the media.” One officer observes that “the truth is we have njoyed this protection for 50 years.” But General Sisi assures him, “The law does not permit, even now, media outlets to cover any news about the armed forces, Omar, even if just a name in an obituary, without the approval of the military intelligence.” Sisi goes on to note that the Egyptian news media are controlled by about two dozen businessmen and urges “a dialogue with those people in an unannounced way, individually, to cajole or intimidate those people.” Today’s (Friday) New York Times reported that the video was leaked to the Islamist website RNN from “sources inside the military.”