Burkina Faso bans BBC, VOA for airing report accusing its army

The Voice of America (VOA) and BBC Afrique programs have been suspended for two weeks by Burkina Faso’s media regulator for airing a Human Rights Watch report that alleged violations against civilians by the Burkinabè army.

In Burkina Faso, access to the websites and digital platforms of Human Rights Watch, VOA, and the BBC is similarly restricted.

“Accordingly, the BBC and VOA, through their correspondents in Burkina Faso, were instructed by telephone to immediately stop rebroadcasting the offending programme on all their platforms,” state-owned news agency Agence d’Information du Burkina (AIB) reported on Thursday.

In addition, the Superior Council for Communication (CSC) forbade any local media outlets from distributing the piece and threatened to take legal action against those who did so.

In an article that was released on Friday, VOA stated that it “stands by its reporting about Burkina Faso and intends to continue to fully and fairly cover activities in the country”.

In a report released on Thursday, Human Rights Watch accused the military of Burkina Faso of killing at least 223 civilians on February 25 in the country’s north.

The French daily Le Monde was suspended by the West African country in December 2023 after it was accused of unfair reporting.

Last year, it also temporarily halted three other foreign media outlets: the French-language journal Jeune Afrique; the French TV channel La Chaîne Info (LCI); and the French state-owned media company France24. (BBC)

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