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CJFE, PEN and CAJ raised concerns with the UNFCC, arguing it used the term “advocacy” — which was not mentioned anywhere in the media accreditation application — in a broad and arbitrary manner which was potentially harmful to speech and press freedoms.

“Opinion pages, special reports, indeed advocacy journalism appears in many of the world’s great news sources, including The Guardian and The New York Times,” wrote Grace Westcott, executive director of PEN Canada, in an Oct. 5 letter to the UNFCCC.

Environment Minister McKenna first expressed her willingness to intervene last week, after the accreditation ban became a media controversy earlier this month.

Levant suggested that the The Rebel — which publishes coverage of environment issues that often exhibits or promotes climate change skepticism — had been rejected by the UNFCCC because of its specific editorial outlook, not because it was an advocacy outlet. “We’re not being excluded because we have an opinion,” he said in an interview. “We’re being excluded because we have the wrong opinion.”

But despite the UNFCC’s willingness to grant The Rebel two spots at the conference, the organization is demanding it be granted the three spots it initially applied for.

“In order to do its job, Rebel Media requires a reporter, a cameraman and a producer,” reads a Monday letter to the UNFCCC from lawyer Stuart M. Robertson, acting on behalf of the company. “Any lateness in making this decision is entirely caused by delays you underwent in the process… It is false to say this matter has just been brought to your attention and that it is too late to accept all those who applied for accreditation. The decisions to deny accreditation were made on the false premise that Rebel Media is an ‘advocacy media outlet.'”