Blair Said To Assail BBC’s Katrina Coverage
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.
Rupert Murdoch, who controls Britain’s Sky News, said on Saturday that Prime Minister Blair of Britain had voiced criticism of the BBC over its coverage of Hurricane Katrina.
Mr. Murdoch, chairman and CEO of News Corp., was joined by Time Warner’s chairman and CEO, Richard Parsons, and Sony’s head, Howard Stringer, for a panel in New York on global media at the Clinton Global Initiative, a conference organized by President Clinton to tackle issues including poverty and religious strife.
“Tony Blair … told me yesterday that he was in Delhi last week and he turned on the BBC World Service to see what was happening in New Orleans, and he said it was just full of hate at America and gloating about our troubles,” said Mr. Murdoch. “That’s pretty general throughout Europe today.”
Mr. Clinton said the BBC’s information was accurate, but it “was designed to be almost exclusively a hit on the federal response.”
The BBC said it had not received any complaint from Mr. Blair’s office and would not comment on what Mr. Murdoch said. But in a statement, the broadcaster said its coverage of Katrina “was committed solely to relaying the events fully, accurately and impartially.”
