NATO, the United States and the Taliban are gearing up for a major spring offensive when the snows melt in a few months after the bloodiest year since the strict Islamists were toppled in 2001. More than 4,000 people died in fighting last year.That's the end paragraph to a little story about a successful strike on Taliban forces.
That paragraph, or one very much like it, I have often seen appended to stories out of Afghanistan from Reuters, as they try to give some context.
That paragraph usually ended with the very important qualifier about those 4,000 who "died": "most of them Taliban militants."
That's kind of important, isn't it?
But in this case, that qualifer is suddenly missing.
Now they are just identified as generic "people."
The impression is one of civilians being killed willy nilly; a scene of escalating violence and defeat, in the bloodiest year!
What it really is, however, is the best year for NATO forces and the worst year for the Taliban.
You wouldn't know any of that from the way Reuters egregiously misreported this important information, though, would you? They can't take sides like that, is it? Putting a positive face on the war is just unthinkable.
Curious.
I mean, it's not like it's their job to report the NEWS, and all it takes is cutting and pasting a stock paragraph! What, the editor was rushed? Didn't understand the big shift in connotation from leaving out that qualifier? Didn't have any curiosity about the meaning of that paragraph? Didn't wonder who comprised that 4,000 who died? Is this an editor or a monkey?
Those excuses shouldn't even defend a high-school newspaper, let alone what is supposed to be professional news product.
Or is it deliberate propaganda?
Which is it?
Is Reuters incompetent, or an active enemy? Those are the only two choices, proven again and again.
