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Emirates News Agency

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Emirates News Agency
وكالة أنباء الإمارات
Agency overview
FormedNovember 1976 (established)
18 June 1977 (began operations)
JurisdictionGovernment of the United Arab Emirates
HeadquartersAbu Dhabi
Agency executives
  • Mohamed Jalal Alrayssi, Director-General
  • Abdulla Abdulkareem, Head of Media Coverage Department
WebsiteWAM

Emirates News Agency (Arabic: وكالة أنباء الإمارات, romanizedWakalat Anba'a al Emarat), also known as WAM, is the official news agency of the United Arab Emirates.[1][2]

History and profile

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The WAM was established in November 1976.[3][4] It started an Arabic service on 18 June 1977, and an English service was established by Peter Hellyer in December 1978.[3]

It is headquartered in Abu Dhabi and is part of the National Media Council.[5]

In addition to its national offices, it has international offices in Cairo, Beirut, Washington, Sanaa, Brussels and Islamabad.[5] It is a member of the Gulf Cooperation Council news agencies, the Federation of Arab News Agencies (FANA),[6] the International Islamic News Agency, the Non-Aligned News Agencies Pool[5] and of the Organization of Asia-Pacific News Agencies (OANA).[7]

The agency has cooperation and news exchange agreements with various news agencies, including the Sudan News Agency, Bernama (Malaysia), Xinhua (China), the Kuwait News Agency, Petra (Jordan), the Indonesian News Agency, and the Saba News Agency (Yemen).[8] Since 2012, the agency has also been in cooperation with Anadolu Agency (Turkey).[9] WAM launched a Hebrew language service in April 2021.[10]

References

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  1. ^ "United Arab Emirates profile". BBC. 27 August 2013. Retrieved 5 February 2014.
  2. ^ "UAE Media Sustainability Index" (PDF). IREX. 2009. Archived from the original (PDF) on 5 September 2014. Retrieved 5 September 2014.
  3. ^ a b "About Us". WAM. Retrieved 5 February 2014.
  4. ^ Khalid Al Jaber; Barrie Gunter (2013). "Evolving News Systems in the Gulf Countries". In Barrie Gunter; Roger Dickinson (eds.). News Media in the Arab World: A Study of 10 Arab and Muslim Countries. New York; London: Bloomsberry. p. 34. ISBN 978-1-4411-0239-3.
  5. ^ a b c Ibrahim Al Abed; Peter Hellyer; Paula Vine (2004). The United Arab Emirates Yearbook 2005. London: Trident Press Ltd. p. 275. ISBN 978-1-900724-89-0.
  6. ^ Federation of Arab News Agencies KUNA. Retrieved 5 January 2014.
  7. ^ K. M. Shrivastava (2007). News Agencies from Pigeon to Internet. Elgin, IL: New Dawn Press. p. 269. ISBN 978-1-932705-67-6.
  8. ^ Emirates News Agency (WAM) (Wakalat Anbaa al-Emarat) in Dubai Directory Data Dubai. Retrieved 5 January 2014.
  9. ^ International Cooperation Archived 25 January 2014 at the Wayback Machine Anadolu Agency. Retrieved 5 January 2014.
  10. ^ "UAE launches official Hebrew-language news service". The Times of Israel. 7 April 2021. Retrieved 9 April 2021.
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