By Toby McIntosh
The International Maritime Organization impedes media coverage of the agency with restrictive rules and the threat of revoking press credentials.
Even for open meetings, reporters are prohibited from quoting what speakers say without getting their explicit permission. This is a logistical nightmare for reporters and virtually all delegates decline to be quoted.
In addition, describing what position a country took in an open meeting can get a reporter into hot water.
Journalists should report “accurately the outcome of discussions” and this “specifically precludes reporting of the discussions themselves,” according to a 2016 IMO email.
A gray area is reporting based on sources. An IMO spokesperson said, “Our guidelines cover reporting from the meetings. We don’t have specific guidance on “sources.”
Asked about not so hypothetical story in which it was reported, “the US and Saudi Arabia opposed…,” the IMO spokesperson answered:
If a journalist was to be saying country X said xxxx – and country X said that they did not give permission to be quoted, then we would consider that specific situation and remind the journalist of the guidelines and T&C. We would look at each specific situation.
Working with such rules, one reporter said, is “a tricky balance!”
The agency has enforced its rules, though rarely, in one case taking away a reporter’s press year for two years.
[This article is one of a series. See main article here.]
Policy Set in 2004
The IMO rules are intended “to maintain an environment which will ensure a free and open exchange of views on subjects…,” according to a policy created by the IMO Council in 2004.
Open meetings are the norm for the IMO Assembly, Council and plenary sessions of committees and sub-committees. However, working groups, drafting groups, correspondence groups and intersessional groups operate in camera.
Explaining the media rules, the 2004 IMO policy says, “All group activity represents work in progress where IMO delegates should be entitled to free and frank expression.” The memo continues, “It is not unreasonable that media interest be focussed on higher level debate and decision making.”
Reporters are told to abide by “Terms and Conditions.”
The first term says “… it will be expected that:
- the media reports accurately the outcome of discussions; and
- named speakers will not be quoted without their prior consent.”
A 2004 document called this policy “a partnership approach.” Another clause states, “Committees, their subsidiary bodies and/or the Organization retain the right to reply seeking rectification of any published inaccuracies.”
Unequal Partnership
But when reporters ask members for permission to quote what they said at an open session, very few oblige.
Ed King, while an editor with Climate Home News in 2016, conducted a test of this several years ago. He learned that “few envoys seem happy to be quoted.”
After approaching 15 delegations, Climate Home found that only three delegations willing to be quoted: the Solomon Islands, Panama and Canada. “Two diplomats objected strongly to requests, apparently offended their national positions on climate change and shipping should be public knowledge,” according to King.
King commented in a 2016 article, “The result is IMO conferences usually appear to end in unity, with the threat of a ban from negotiations encouraging the media to stay in line and report another week of slow – but steady – progress.”
Reflecting on the IMO situation two years later, King wrote, “Reporters are allowed to write about outcomes, but not process.” In a 2018 blog post he said:
It’s hard for journalists to operate at IMO
Don’t get me wrong — the food is nice and we are given water. The press team are friendly people. We’re not shot at or threatened. But the IMO does have weird rules governing how reporters can operate.
So if — for instance — a small island state happens to say climate change is over-rated and there’s no point in discussing the issue — you’re not allowed to report this, unless you get the express permission of the person who said it. Who, in most cases, will say no.
Reporters are allowed to write about outcomes, but not process. In IMO parlance “This specifically precludes reporting of the discussions themselves” which for anyone who has worked at other UN venues is — quite simply — rather unique. And rather defeats the purpose of having media watching proceedings.
Checking Quotes Not the Norm
The IMO stipulation that reporters seek permission to quote speakers at open meetings is not a customary norm, as maintained by the IMO, according to top press officials at other international organizations.
IMO spokesperson Natasha Brown told EYE, “Usual journalistic practice is to seek permission before quoting someone.”
To the contrary, according to communications officials at a variety of international organizations, who said reporters are free to quote speakers at open meetings.
“Yes reporters are allowed to quote delegates freely,” responded a spokesperson at one UN body. “The only exception is for a closed meeting, in which case the room would be physically closed to the press and the meeting would not be webcast.”
A longstanding media officer at another major international organization wrote:
Open meetings – that is, open to media – are always considered on the record. It would be highly unusual to seek quote clearance, particularly since in our age virtually all open meetings are streamed online.
How individual interviews are handled is different, he noted, so reporters and interviewees may agree to check quotes. Otherwise, he concluded:
An open event is either open or it isn’t. There is no half-pregnant.
Bizarre.
Punishment for Violating IMO Rules
Megan Darby had just started working at Climate Home News, and admits to not having read the IMO rules at the time. She “quite innocently” started reporting on which country said what during a meeting. Darby was invited in for a coffee at which the rules were explained.
She nevertheless published an article describing a position taken by the Cook Islands. Her July 2016 article said:
Yet at the last IMO environmental committee meeting, its representative Captain Ian Finley agitated against even talking about a climate target for shipping.
A modest proposal to set up a working group was “right out of left field,” he fumed. “To be honest I am staggered that this was even suggested.”
“The Cook Islands were absolutely furious,” recalled King, her editor at the time. “Basically they were outed as climate deniers who were taking part in climate talks.”
Called in again, for a less friendly meeting, Darby was given a reprimand letter and barred from attending IMO meetings for two years. Climate Home was asked to apologize in print and published “a slightly arcane apology,” said King.
Clarification 27/7:
Quotes from Captain Ian Finley were made during a meeting of the IMO’s Marine Environment Protection Committee held from 18-22 April 2016. These meetings are open to media but do not allow for the naming of speakers in reports without prior consent. As such the publication of these quotes was a violation of the IMO’s terms and conditions for media access, specifically rule 9 of the Rules of Procedure relating to the MEPC.
Darby is now back on the beat and tries to work around the rules she still considers “absurd” and “a real barrier to accountability.”
Broad Threat
She may be the only reporter to have been banned, but others have received warnings, so the constraints are well understood among IMO reporters. And by the delegates and interest groups with credentials to attend meetings.
The potential for punishment of reporters is elaborated with open-to-interpretation language contained in a description of media accreditation:
At any time, the Public Information Service of IMO may revoke accreditation if it is put to improper use; if it is determined that the accreditation has not been used to cover IMO meetings; if it has been used to abuse the privileges so extended; or if personal or public conduct is deemed not to be consistent with the best interests of the Organization.
Neville Smith, now the director of a maritime PR consultancy, Mariner Communications, wrote about his experience covering the IMO as a reporter for Lloyd’s List the mid-2000s.
“I was not encouraged to be nasty to the IMO, but certainly my youthful exuberance was tolerated as I biffed and bashed the organisation and its member states for the glacial pace of its bureaucratic process,” he wrote in April 2018.
He recalled sitting at “the back of plenary where the NGOs sit,” adding, “It turns out this was the best place to be, as they would tell you what was actually happening rather than my having to plough through interminable docs or wait for the official reports.”
Smith said that “at one point my infractions were so many that the secretariat cut me off altogether and I had to use a mole.”
In a more humorous but telling story about IMO sensitivity, King was reprimanded for posting a picture of a sign at IM headquarters that he thought was amusing considering that the IMO regulates the handling of ballast water. The sign said, “Delegates are not flushing the loos. Please flush the loos.”
Work-Arounds
Reporters still find ways to get information and publish it without running afoul of the IMO’s communications office.
Reporters get some useable information from public statements issued in advance of meetings by governments. For example, Container reported on a statement sent by the Marshall Islands, Liberia and some major shipping industry groups. The IMO said it has no objections to reporting on such public statements.
Reporters also get news from sources, including both industry and non-industry representatives of consultative groups.
Smith recalled:
A few delegations complained that I had quoted them without asking permission (which I had) the matter was raised with my editor who pointed out the need to comply with the reporting guidelines. It was possible to still report and make general observations rather than use direct quotes, which seemed to do the trick.
One reporter told EYE, “I found even observers will tell you where countries stand, but only on background, not for attribution, because they’re also worried about losing their credentials.
“As a journalist I have been able to ask my contacts and they forward things to me,” Darby said. Having contacts is critical for covering IMO meetings. “If you don’t know anyone to ask, you’re screwed,” King said.
Reporters occasionally have been able to get documents from the documents desk at the IMO by not revealing their true identities.
So informal avenues exist to circumvent the rules, now including tweets from meeting attendees.
The IMO rules, King said, are “increasingly obsolete.”
Not About How the Sausage Was Made.
A review of press coverage, and comments by regular observers, indicates that stories about the IMO are mostly about the outcomes, not the process.
“There is generally not a ton of media interest,” said one NGO representative, who described media coverage as “generally just fairly superficial.” Another commented, “It’s certainly quite hard to get interest in the media beyond the shipping media.”
Larger media outlets pay scant attention to the agency, observers agree. It’s the trade press that provides the bulk of the IMO news, writing mainly for the shipping industry and shippers in publications such as The Maritime Executive, WorkBoat, Splash, Trade Link, PortNews, Hellenic Shipping News Worldwide and Trade Winds.
A long-time IMO observer, John Maggs, a Senior Policy Advisor at Seas at Risk, wrote in a March 2018 blog post, “For the last 21 years the industry has successfully lobbied against carbon regulation, with scarcely a flicker of media coverage of what it was doing.”
More media attention arrived as the worked more on issues with environmental impact. The 90,000 merchant ships account for close to 3% of global greenhouse gas emissions and in April, the agency The potential for more shipping in the arctic has raised concerns about oil spills there, resulting in limits on certain fuels.
Environmental policy reporters dug more into the development of policies, which can take years, and country positions, which typically have a very low profile.
Levon Sevunts, reporting for Radio Canada International in Eye on the Arctic, discovered in March of 2018 that the Canadian government “is trying to water down a plan by Finland for an outright ban of the highly polluting fuel used by most ships plying the rapidly warming Arctic.”
The disclosure was contained in documents Sevunts obtained from sources after his requests for them to the IMO and the Canadian government were denied.
“There is very little in-depth reporting on what the IMO does” outside of the environmental press, Sevunts said.
Other reporters also are reporting in more depth on internal debates on environmental topics, apparently without IMO retaliation.
Sara Stefanini, of Climate Change News, delved into country positions on the topic of ships using heavy fuel in the arctic, reporting in April of 2018:
Most Arctic countries are supporting the ban, including Norway, Sweden, Finland and Iceland, along with the Netherlands, Germany and New Zealand. Finland has proposed imposing it by 2021.
But there are potential spoilers too. Russia, one of the biggest shipping players in the Arctic, has not expressed support for the ban, and other big shipping countries outside the region appear resistant any move to close off the emerging route.
In articles about the Maritime Environmental Protection Committee’s actions in April on greenhouse gases, much of the reporting touched on only the final stages of disagreement (votes are not held at the IMO).
Ship and Bunker wrote, “The deal made today at this week’s 72nd meeting of IMO’s Marine Environmental Protection Committee (MEPC 72) follows reports yesterday that only two nations – Saudi Arabia and the US – stood in the way of the historic deal.”
Others delved deeper.
Reporter Catherine Early in China Dialogue on April 16, 2018, provided more detail:
Friday’s agreement was struck following two weeks of intense negotiations. Small island states such as the Marshall Islands, which are particularly vulnerable to sea level rise, had been pushing for complete decarbonisation by 2035, while EU member states were suggesting cuts of 70-100% by 2050.
Brazil and Argentina had been pushing against absolute reduction targets, arguing that their geographic location, far from other markets, meant that they would be disadvantaged by measures such as reducing speed on ships, which would especially hit exports of fresh produce.
China had also been opposed to absolute emissions reductions, though it had not put forward any proposed targets of its own. However, China and Argentina did not in the end oppose the deal. Only the US and Saudi Arabia made an official objection to the draft text, with Brazil opposing the absolute carbon target.
So some reporters have found ways to circumvent the restrictions, but as one journalist put it, reporting at the IMO is “a tricky balance!”
