The BBC then interviewed someone who turned out to be an HTS spokesman in Idlib.
From Vanessa Beeley:
Ibrahim al-Wadi, a researcher and former Syrian army soldier with whom I work regularly, identified my interviewee as Hakim al-Dairi (aka Dia al-Din al-Omar), a spokesman for HTS’s General Security Directorate.
And again, the BBC did not identify their “witnesses” or their affiliations.
Did the BBC break the law?
Article 12(2) Terrorism Act of 2000 As a criminal agency, it has the following powers:
Soliciting support for a prohibited organization (support solicited does not have to be material support, such as the provision of money or other property, but can also include emotional support or approval)
So, one could say that by promoting hooded and masked members of a terrorist organisation as credible witnesses, the BBC invited support for them and their views, and broke the law in the process.
Last week I wrote to the BBC's communications team, BBC Director General Tim Davie and Tim Orford, head of programmes and documentaries at BBC Arabic, asking:
…Could the BBC please comment on why the BBC documentary did not inform viewers that the organisations interviewed in Idlib are in fact the intelligence services of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), a terrorist organisation banned by the UK and the US, formerly Al-Nusra Front (Al-Qaeda), and that specific individuals interviewed have been implicated in war crimes in Syria, including the murder of children in Idlib?
To date, there has been no response from the BBC. No denial, nothing.
The documentary is still available to watch on the BBC World Service's YouTube channel, but has been removed from iPlayer. Why? Again, they have refused to comment on this question.
this is This is not the first time Of course, the BBC appears to have collaborated with terrorist groups in Syria.
As a result of airing the Captagon documentary, the Syrian government BBC's media accreditation revoked.
The Syrian government cited the BBC's history of “biased and misleading reporting” as the basis for its decision and said the organisation had failed to adhere to professional standards.
If you want to know more about the background to this story,BBC normalizes terrorist organization to frame Syrian president' posted on Vanessa Beeley's Substack.
Finally, the following Last Friday's UK column News ExtraVanessa Beeley, Patrick Henningsen and I discussed this issue further.
