His Majesty King Hussien ibn Talal
The Royal Palace
Amman
Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan

Vienna,12 June 1997

Your Majesty,

The International Press Institute (IPI) is most concerned about the threat to press freedom in Jordan posed by recent amendments to the 1993 Press and Publications Law that set sweeping restrictions on the media.

The amendments, which were ratified by royal decree last month without parliamentary debate, give the state broad powers to fine, suspend, or permanently close newspapers found to be in violation of the new law’s provision, and also impose on publications arbitrary and discriminatory financial obligations.

The revised law forbids journalists from writing about Jordan’s armed forces and security services and retains the ban on anything which offends the king and royal family, contains contempt of religion, damages national unity, encourages crime, undermines confidence in the Jordanian dinar or offends public morals. Under the new law, weekly newspapers are required to increase their capital from 15,000 to 300,000 dinars. We are informed that the new financial requirements would force many of Jordan’s critical weeklies, which have a circulation of just a few thousand, to fold.

On the occasion of its November 1996 meeting in Amman, the IPI Executive Board was encouraged when the then Minister of Information Marwan Muasher – questioned about the weaknesses of the 1993 press law – conceded that there were grounds to take a “good hard look at the law.” IPI believes, however, that the new amendments violate the rights to freedom of opinion and expression as guaranteed by the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and are aimed more at silencing the critical voice of the country’s weekly newspapers before the parliamentary elections due to be held in November than at protecting national interests.

IPI, the global network of editors and media executives from newspapers, magazines, broadcasting organisations and news agencies in 98 countries, urges Your Majesty to revoke the amendments to the Press and Publications Law and ensure that future initiatives to regulate the media are conducted in the context of public debate.

We thank you for your attention.

Yours sincerely,

Johann P. Fritz
Director