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Former Guardian editor Alan Rusbridger has resigned from the Commission on the Future of the Media.
Rusbridger had come under pressure as a result of the recent admission by former Guardian columnist Roy Greenslade that he had been a supporter of the IRA while working for the newspaper.
The Guardian published an article by Greenslade in 2014 criticizing Máiría Cahill, who was the victim of sexual abuse by a former IRA member. Ms Cahill has asked Rusbridger to resign from the commission, which was created by the Government to make recommendations on the future of the media in Ireland.
Fine Gael Sen. Regina Doherty and Labor leader Alan Kelly also called for Rusbridger’s resignation. Last week, the commission said it unanimously supported Rusbridger to continue in office, and the government said it wanted him to remain in office.
However, Rusbridger announced his resignation Sunday night to eliminate distractions from his job.
In a statement issued through the government press office, he said: “I was pleased to be invited by the Taoiseach to join the Commission for the Future of the Media. I was encouraged by your support for my continued participation, along with the Minister of Culture and Media, Catherine Martin.
“The unanimous support of my colleagues on the Commission was very important to me. The Commission is considering critical issues for Ireland and I do not want my participation to be a distraction from its work, so I have told its chair, Professor Brian MacCraith, that I will resign.
The Taoiseach and Ms. Martin thanked Rusbridger for his “significant contribution” to the commission to date.
Ms Cahill told a BBC Spotlight program in 2014 that as a teenager she was raped by an IRA member and that the IRA had tried to cover up the assault.
He later complained to The Guardian about the article written by Greenslade.
Rusbridger issued another apology a week ago for publishing the Greenslade article, in which Greenslade had questioned Cahill’s motive for speaking at the time.
Rusbridger said that while he knew at the time that Greenslade was a Sinn Féin supporter, he said he did not know he supported the IRA campaign. I wish I had known. I wouldn’t have published it now and I’m sorry, ”he told The Irish Times last week.
The Future of Media Commission, where Rusbridger has chaired Zoom sessions, was appointed by the Government in September 2020 and is due to present its report in the coming months.
Ms. Cahill’s attorneys complained about Greenslade’s article at the time and the matter was referred by the newspaper’s attorneys to then-Guardian reader editor Chris Elliott, although Rusbridger was not informed.
Elliott said he could “see no reason to suggest that the article has a number of significant factual inaccuracies.”
However, Rusbridger has now apologized “both for the article and for the discomfort it must have caused him” because the article “fails spectacularly for transparency reasons.”
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