Echorouk
 |
|
| Type | Daily newspaper |
|---|---|
| Format | Tabloid |
| Owner(s) | Ech-chorouk Information |
| Editor | Nasr Eddine Kacem |
| Founded | 1990 |
| Political alignment | Centre-left |
| Language | Arabic |
| Headquarters | Maison de la presse Abdelkader Safir, Kouba, Algiers |
| Website | Echorouk |
Echorouk (in Arabic الشروق اليومي) or Ech Chorouk El Youmi (Arabic, aš-šurūqu-l-yawmi, The Daily Dawn) is a daily newspaper in Algeria published Saturday to Thursday in the tabloid format. It is the second-largest daily Arabophone newspaper (after El Khabar).
History and profile
Echrouk was started in 1990 under the name of Echorouk Al Arabi.[1] The paper is independent, and often critical of the government, as well as strongly critical of the Islamist rebel movements which remain active after the Algerian Civil War.[2] The paper also publishes Ech Chorouk El Ousboui, a weekly supplement.[2]
The paper's online version was the third most visited website for 2010 in the MENA region.[3]
2006 Qadhafi affair
In a fall 2006 trial, the leader of neighbouring Libya, Muammar Gaddafi, took the unprecedented step of suing the paper in an Algerian court for defamation. The court decided on October 31 that Ech Chorouk's reporting of Qadhafi's attempts to induce Algerian Tuaregs to separatism had slandered the Libyan leader, and suspended the paper for two months. The editor and the responsible reporter were both sentenced to six months in jail. The verdict was condemned as a strike against press freedom by virtually the entire Algerian independent press and numerous political parties, as well as from international press watchdogs.[4]
