AT&T Inc. (T), the largest U.S. phone company, was sued by Al Jazeera over its refusal to to carry the Qatar-based broadcaster’s new U.S. cable-news channel as part of its pay-television service.
The Dallas-based company is violating an agreement with Al Jazeera’s U.S. unit by refusing to broadcast the channel, which began airing in the U.S. yesterday, according to a filing inDelaware Chancery Court. The network, controlled by the Qatari royal family, paid $500 million for Al Gore’s money-losing Current TV in January and rebranded it.
AT&T’s U-verse pay-TV service said Aug. 19 it wouldn’t carry Al Jazeera America because of a contract dispute. U-verse began in 2006 and has 5 million video customers in states such as Texas and California.
AT&T officials’ decision amounts to a “wrongful termination of an affiliation agreement,” Al Jazeera said in the filing, which accompanied a sealed complaint. Details on the case came from a cover sheet that contained a brief description of the network’s claims.
Under the court’s rules, a public version of the complaint must be filed within five days unless a judge grants an extension to the sealing of the case.
‘Certain Breaches’
“As a result of our inability to come to terms on a new agreement and due to certain breaches of the existing agreement we have decided not to carry Current TV on U-verse,” Brad Burns, an AT&T spokesman, said yesterday in an e-mailed statement.
Al Jazeera officials contend the AT&T left them “no choice” other than to file a breach-of-contract suit over the decision to drop the channel, according to an e-mailed statement,
“AT&T’s decision to unilaterally delete Al Jazeera America presented us with circumstances that were untenable -- an affiliate that has willfully and knowingly breached its contractual obligations,” Stan Collender, a partner in Qorvis Communications in Washington, said on behalf of the broadcaster. The aim of the suit is to “compel AT&T to do the right thing,” he added.
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