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Jailed Norway journalist freed in Yemen

A Norwegian journalist held in Yemen since late March has been released and is on his way home, the Norwegian foreign ministry said Friday.

Published: 17 April 2015 18:19 CEST

Jailed Norway journalist freed in Yemen

Raymond Lidal in 2011. Photo: Private

Raymond Lidal, a 28-year-old freelancer, "was evacuated this afternoon together with other foreign citizens," foreign ministry spokesman Rune Bjastad told AFP. "He is on his way out of Yemen to Norway," he added, refusing to disclose any details of Lidal's release.

Lidal was detained in the Yemeni capital Sanaa in late March. He was accused of spying when he failed to show a journalist's visa while filming Saudi-led airstrikes against Huthi Shiite rebels, Norwegian daily

VG reported last week.

At the time, Norway's foreign ministry had only confirmed the arrest of a Norwegian national in Sanaa, but would not comment on his identity or the reasons for the arrest.

Iran-backed Huthi rebels have seized swathes of territory in Yemen since they entered Sanaa in September, forcing the government to flee and prompting airstrikes since March 26 by a Saudi-led coalition of Arab states.

Norway TV flooded with complaints after Eid broadcast

The Norwegian journalist Rima Iraki led the Celebration atfer the Fast programme. Photo: NRK

According to Erik Skarrud, the ombudsman's secretary, the organisation received 93 reports after the broadcast of “The Celebration after the Fast” on Sunday night, of which only a handful were positive.

“Someone called it 'propaganda for Islam' and a large number of them used the same sort of expression. There's probably a text somewhere that people are cutting and pasting from,” he told Kampanje magazine.

Others complained they “did not want to pay for something that could lead to terror”.

Over 300,000 people tuned in to watch the broadcast, which was helmed by the popular journalist Rima Iraki, the former presenter of NRK's Dagsrevyen news programme.

Eirik Sandberg Ingstad, who led the project, said he felt the experiment, the first such broadcast by a major Western TV channel, had been a huge success.

“We are pretty pleased with it. The response from the audience during and after the broadcast has been overwhelmingly positive, which indicates that we succeeded in creating a party where everyone felt welcome,” he told Kampanje.

The controversy prompted Norway's culture minister Abid Raja to write an opinion article, “When can I say 'my Norway'?, on NRK complaining of people's unwillingness to accept Muslim citizens as truly Norwegian.

He said that he himself had fasted on-and-off for Eid all his life, despite “not being the best Muslim in class”, and had found it emotional to see it celebrated by the nation.

“It was a historic event when our public broadcaster, as the first in a western country, dedicated an evening to the celebration of the end of the fast,” he said.

But that feeling had changed to “discomfort” as he learned of the complaints, he said, reminding him of the kind of abuse he received growing up in Norway, and still today as a minister: “You are not a Norwegian. This is not your Norway. Go back where you came from you Muslim bastard, you Paki.”

He said he had always tried not to provoke those who felt only ethnically Norwegian should use the term.

“For many years I lived with a kind of compromise. Instead of calling myself a 'Norwegian', I chose to use the terms 'new Norwegian' or 'brown Norwegian', in an attempt not to provoke people who are put out by me saying 'I am Norwegian',” he wrote.

But he said he wanted to change that.

“I was born in Norway, in Oslo, and with the exception of one academic year in Oxford and one working year at the Norwegian Embassy in India, I have lived all my life in Norway,” he said.

“My wife, Nadia, has too. My children are Norwegian. And I want to be buried in Norway when that day comes. From cradle to grave, I am Norwegian.”

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