KATHMANDU, June 15 (AFP) - More than two dozen private radio stations have defied a ban on news bulletins imposed when King Gyanendra grabbed power in Nepal in February -- to broadcast news about the king.
The FM stations cheekily used the occasion of Gyanendra's trip to Doha to test the government's seriousness about the ban, their representative said Wednesday, airing news of the royal visit on Monday and Tuesday.
Raghu Mainali, coordinator of the Movement to Save Independent Radio (MSIR), an alliance of private radios fighting the ban, said the two-to-four minute bulletins were broadcast by about 27 FM stations across the country in protest at the government's failure to meet radio station representatives to discuss the ban.
Apparently in a dilemma about how to punish stations broadcasting news of the king's visit to Qatar, the government has taken no action.
But the Communications and Information Ministry published a notice in local newspapers Wednesday warning that station owners would be punished if they continued to defy the rules.
Mainali said his group had managed to see officials from the ministry Wednesday and he was hopeful that formal talks between MSIR representatives and high-level officials would begin on Thursday.
The Federation of Nepalese Journalists, the Forum for Environmental Journalists, the Nepal Press Institute and Media Service International have all expressed their solidarity with the MSIR.
Dozens of journalists have been rounded up by police but later released after staging protests in the last few weeks against the media restrictions, including the ban on radio broadcasts of news.
The Federation of Nepalese Journalists says more than 2,000 reporters have lost their jobs since Gyanendra's power grab, with several news outlets shut down under a state of emergency that included press censorship.
The king lifted the state of emergency at the end of April but has continued to restrict press freedoms and the right to protest."
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