President and General Manager of KABC TV said that the cameraman that insulted Armenians while interviewing Turkish Genocide deniers on April 24 will not be used in the future by the channel’s news operations, Azbarez reports.
“We thank the community for bringing this video to our attention. ABC7 does not condone what was said on the video and apologizes to those offended. The photographer in question was not a staff employee of ABC7 and the station has determined his services will no longer be used,” said KABC TV President and General Manager, Cheryl Kunin Fair, in an email in response to an Asbarez article. The article exposed a cameraman hired by ABC7 Eyewitness news who called Armenians “thug-like idiots” while conducting an interview with Ergun Kirlikovali, the former president of the Assembly of Turkish American Associations and another Turkish Genocide denier Nur Hostetler on April 24 during the Armenian Genocide Rally for Justice in front of the Turkish Consulate in Los Angeles.
The segment aired on Channel 7, however, was disturbed by three critical points in the coverage which the station touts as being “fair and accurate,” Asbarez reports.
The anchor Michelle Tuzee does not use the word Genocide to describe the day’s events calling it “massacres” and Eyewitness News deploys an old—and rather stale—trick by including the Turkish denialist perspective. The reporter also describes a gathering of a handful Turks at the Turkish Consulate on April 24 as a “counter protest,” without mentioning that Turkish flags that were propped up outnumbered the Turkish protesters.
In a joint statement on Tuesday, the Armenian National Committee of America-Western Region and the Armenian Youth Federation framed the issue properly, by thanking ABC7 for its prompt response to the insult, but also pointing out that featuring Armenian Genocide deniers on its air is not “fair” coverage of the issue.
ANCA-WR and the AYF-WR requested an immediate meeting with the station leadership to further discuss this issue. We look forward to your prompt response,” concluded the statement.
