Last week we documented a BBC Radio 4 podcast in which the corporation’s audiences were once again misled on the topic of a January 2024 ruling by the International Court of Justice:
BBC RADIO 4 PODCAST PROMOTES STILL MORE ‘GENOCIDE’ DISINFORMATION
In that podcast featuring Husam Zomlot, BBC presenter Nick Robinson made the following claim: [emphasis added]
Robinson: “Well they [the ICJ] haven’t found there was genocide…”
Zomlot [interrupts] “They did!”
Robinson: “No, no – they’ve said it’s plausible that it might have been committed…”
Zomlot [interrupts] “Good.”
Robinson: “They have not said that there has been genocide.”
CAMERA UK submitted a complaint to the BBC, pointing out that it has known since April that the ICJ did not say that it is plausible that genocide might have been committed and referencing two items of the corporation’s own content on that matter – the interview with the former president of the ICJ and the article by the BBC’s legal correspondent.
We also noted that if BBC management has not already put out a memo clarifying this issue to its staff, there is clearly an urgent need to do so in light of the repeated disinformation appearing in BBC content.
On December 13th – eight days after the submission of that complaint – we received a response informing us that it would take more time to address the issue. Later the same day, we received the following:
“Thank you for contacting us about Political Thinking with Nick Robinson.
We discussed your points in detail with the programme team and appreciate this opportunity to clarify the matter. You’re correct in regards to the wording of the interim finding of the ICJ. This particular exchange only appeared on the extended version of the programme which was available on BBC Sounds, and so we’ve taken steps to ensure that edition accurately reflects the discussion on genocide allegations. We have updated the version for listeners and also published a clarification on the programme description here:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m0025kqj
“Update: This episode has been edited to remove a brief exchange suggesting that an interim finding by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) found it plausible that genocide had been committed in Gaza. The ICJ actually decided that the Palestinians had a plausible right to be protected from genocide and we’re happy to make that clear.”
We appreciate this opportunity to take corrective steps here, and value the time you’ve taken to highlight the matter.”
That clarification appears as follows:
This is at least the tenth time that the BBC has had to correct inaccurate claims concerning that ICJ ruling:
BBC UNABLE TO REPLY TO A COMPLAINT ABOUT ITEMS IT ALREADY AMENDED
BBC ISSUES BELATED CORRECTION ON INACCURATE ICJ CLAIM
CAMERA UK PROMPTS CORRECTION TO BBC ‘GENOCIDE’ DISINFORMATION
BBC NEWS CORRECTS YET MORE ICJ RULING DISINFORMATION
As we see, disinformation on that topic nevertheless continues to appear in BBC content.