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ISLAM

Death threats and new editions stoke mag row

An inquiry has been launched after graffitied death threats to satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo were found in the town of Albi, in the south of France, as editors reveal they will publish two versions of the paper this week: a "responsible" and an "irresponsible" one.

Graffiti daubed in blue paint on a community centre spotted by police reportedly read “death to Charlie Hebdo”, “for the prophet”, “we are going to kill you” and “death to the USA”.

Violence erupted over the cartoons of Muhammad in a sensitive area of the town on Saturday night. Police were called out at 11pm to burning vehicles and wheelie bins.

Meanwhile, editors at the magazine have revealed this week’s edition will have two copies – a “responsible” one, for those who criticised the publication of cartoons last week, and an “irresponsible” one, which will be a “normal Charlie Hebdo”.

Editor in Chief, known just as Charb, said the two copies will be written by the same staff but have completely different content. Some 100,000 copies will be published – 25,000 more than usual.

The magazine came under heavy criticism for publishing cartoons of the Muslim prophet last week. European MP Daniel Cohn-Bendit called the editors “idiots” and “masochists”, while France’s Christian Democratic party said the “put the lives of others at risk”.

Charb said: “[you will see] in the responsible edition what people like Cohn-Bendit want to read.”

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BUSINESS

Google News to return to Spain after seven-year spat

Google announced Wednesday the reopening of its news service in Spain next year after the country amended a law that imposed fees on aggregators such as the US tech giant for using publishers’ content.

Google News to return to Spain after seven-year spat
Google argues its news site drives readers to Spanish newspaper and magazine websites and thus helps them generate advertising revenue.Photo: Kenzo TRIBOUILLARD / AFP

The service closed in Spain in December 2014 after legislation passed requiring web platforms such as Google and Facebook to pay publishers to reproduce content from other websites, including links to their articles that describe a story’s content.

But on Tuesday the Spanish government approved a European Union copyright law that allows third-party online news platforms to negotiate directly with content providers regarding fees.

This means Google no longer has to pay a fee to Spain’s entire media industry and can instead negotiate fees with individual publishers.

Writing in a company blog post on Wednesday, Google Spain country manager Fuencisla Clemares welcomed the government move and announced that as a result “Google News will soon be available once again in Spain”.

“The new copyright law allows Spanish media outlets — big and small — to make their own decisions about how their content can be discovered and how they want to make money with that content,” she added.

“Over the coming months, we will be working with publishers to reach agreements which cover their rights under the new law.”

News outlets struggling with dwindling print subscriptions have long seethed at the failure of Google particularly to pay them a cut of the millions it makes from ads displayed alongside news stories.

Google argues its news site drives readers to newspaper and magazine websites and thus helps them generate advertising revenue and find new subscribers.

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