So what if the picture is of the Radcliffe Camera, the Bod’s history reading room? Read on, there’s a scoop of sub-atomic, blogospheric size hidden in here…

To the launch of the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism.

Al Jazeera DG Wadah Khanfar is on a panel with BBC Director of News Helen Boaden and Washington Post Exec Ed Len Downie. The event is chaired by Timothy Garton Ash who confusingly, for fans of 70s toga-soap I Claudius,* combines the vocal mannerisms of Derek Jacobi’s emperor with the appearance of an emaciated Brian Blessed (Augustus).

I want to ask a question, but unfortunately I’m invisible to TGA, whose antennae are a little more attuned to the establishment.

So here’s the background to my question. Just recently, Al Jazeera English MD Nigel Parsons co-wrote a piece for the Indy. Here’s the bit that caught my eye:

I spend a lot of time with Wadah Khanfar, my opposite number at the Arabic language service. We are working on a common code of ethics and practice. One issue that has come up is that of language. Will we, for instance, use the phrase “suicide bomber”? Al Jazeera tends not to. In Arabic the word suicide carries with it a moral judgement that it does not in English. The phrase they use, however, translates as something close to martyr, and we can’t use that. [my italics]

Interesting. Khanfar’s the boss now, not the ‘opposite number.’ Anyway, I wanted to ask – What ARE you going to call suicide bombers? One AJEer told me they still hadn’t agreed it and couldn’t tell me (!)…but (sub-atomic scoop fanfare) the details of their editorial linguistic conundrums would be published tomorrow (i.e. in a couple of hours from this post) on their website. So look out for them (end of fanfare). Thank goodness they haven’t had to report on any ‘suicide bombings’ since going on air…

Other highlights:

*Khanfar reminded everyone that Al Jaz had actually provided Israel with an editorial platform in the Middle East.
*Helen Boaden tipped her hat to FNC, in a reversal of Roger Mosey’s position.
*Len Downie admitted that no-one could tell him what to put in the paper – after a keynote speech welcoming the advice of academics! (But we knew what he meant…)
*John Lloyd, just being there.

But the evening was about the Reuters Institute. Good luck to it, and all who sail in it.

*Yes, Robert Graves etc.