The article as a whole discussed Islam and particularly the Prophet in reverential tones. We should be able to discuss them openly, which is what we did. If we make it unlawful to look at them, we give them an importance they don't deserve, as if there's something holy or special about them. And I personally believe these cartoons should be published. And we felt that these cartoons had already been shown on Al-Jazeera and Al-Arabiya and millions of Muslims had seen them. ![]() We had a meeting to discuss this before we published them, so it wasn't an accident. He had no say over what I published.ĭo you regret now the decision to run the cartoons, however censored, given the climate? There are plenty of religious fanatics in Yemen, even if they're a minority. The Yemen Observer has an independent line, and while it's true that our CEO is close to the government, when he hired me he granted me complete editorial independence. Your newspaper has been closely identified with the government, so is this the result of some sort of factional dispute within it? But people in the street are wiser than the government. Even if you were a Danish person you could walk the streets of Yemen safely, and I could too. And the government says they're keeping you in prison in the meantime for your own protection. And some religious leaders, including some who are even members of the Yemeni Parliament, have called for your execution. Nonetheless, you're now being prosecuted for an offense with a possible life sentence. They're not even members of the journalists' guild. It's an instrument of blackmail, any journalist in Yemen would tell you that. Yes it is, but this isn't a legitimate newspaper. So your own colleagues instigated your arrest? Isn't that a sad commentary on the press in Yemen? But the government responded by revoking our license to publish and putting me in jail. Theirs is a newspaper that lives by blackmail, everybody knows that. We refused, and they collected signatures on a petition that they presented to the prosecutor. But then one of the directors of approached the Yemen Observer owners to blackmail us-that unless we paid them they would raise a stink. Unfortunately by an innocent mistake in the production process, a thumbnail of the cartoons appeared on the front page-only 1.5cm by 2cm, you could hardly read it. We reprinted the cartoons but blacked them out. When we ran our article on the Danish cartoons, it was all about how the Prophet should be honored, with quotations from famous people about what an important figure he was, and a news story on Yemeni protests. That is one of the characteristics of the Yemeni government, putting journalists in jail to stop us from telling the truth to the public. You mean to say the government has a prosecutor dedicated to the press, and that prosecutor has a dedicated jail? A couple are journalists, because it's the prison of the prosecutor for press and publications. There are 15 of us sharing one big room and one toilet, but the others aren't common criminals. It's a basement, and we have to buy everything we need, even bottled water. I'm in a temporary prison, awaiting a hearing, so it's not so bad. Mohammed al-Asaadi: It's the first time ever I've been a prisoner, or even in front of a judge. NEWSWEEK: Is this your first time in jail? NEWSWEEK arranged for a visitor to take a cell phone to him today, and NEWSWEEK's Rod Nordland interviewed him by phone. He is now in jail in Sanaa, the capital of Yemen, awaiting trial. ![]() 11, he was arrested and charged with insulting the Prophet. But when his newspaper ran an article about the Danish cartoons depicting the Prophet Muhammad as a terrorist, Asaadi decided to reprint the cartoons-albeit with a large X censoring most of them, and an article denouncing them. As the editor in chief of the generally pro-government Yemen Observer, a weekly English-language newspaper published by Yemeni president Ali Abdullah Saleh's media adviser, al-Asaadi has not been party to the sort of controversies that have seen many Yemeni journalists jailed in recent years. Mohammed al-Asaadi is an improbable martyr to a free press.
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