The creepy EU-funded TV station "Euronews" is a menace. Admittedly, not much of a menace because almost no-one watches its hours of dreary euro-coverage. But nonetheless, it is not an organisation with particularly high news values.
It was the only news organisation to say that "I want a referendum" was behind the recent crane stunt (wrong). Having been woken up several times between 3 and 4 AM yesterday by journos who actually wanted to check who was responsible before writing, it was then a bit dissapointing of "Euronews" to nonetheless say that IWR was responsible for what they are calling "operation squirrel". (See report below.)
EuroNews - English Version
March 3, 2008
'Squirrel' action for EU treaty referendum
SECTION: Europa
LENGTH: 151 words
Two members of the 'I Want a Referendum campaign' group (or IWR), in Britain, have staged a protest up a crane near the houses of parliament in Westminster.
They called it 'Operation Squirrel'.
'All we want is a referendum on the new EU treaty, like the govenment promised,' they said.
IWR is a cross-party campaign.
Prime Minister Gordon Brown argues the Lisbon treaty is much less far-reaching than the EU constitution which was rejected by French and Dutch voters in 2005, and so it does not need to be put to a referendum vote.
The crane-climbing comes just a couple of days before the Conservative opposition is due to make a formal proposal for a referendum.
Meanwhile, the IWR are very excited about an unofficial poll they conducted in ten Labour and Liberal Democrat constituencies in February.
The group hailed the response as substantial, and said some 88 percent of the respondents wanted a referendum.
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