News Corp. has agreed to form an external diversity council after meeting with civil rights groups about a New York Post cartoon that critics said likened President Barack Obama to a dead chimpanzee.
The company will form a "diversity community council" in New York City that will meet with senior company executives twice a year, NAACP President and CEO Benjamin Todd Jealous said Wednesday. It also will include a statement of commitment to diversity in its annual report.
News Corp. Chairman Rupert Murdoch published an apology in the Post soon after the cartoon appeared in February, but pressure for further action continued. Jealous called the cartoon an “invitation for assassination” and urged a boycott of the paper and the firing of the editor and cartoonist. The Rev. Al Sharpton asked the Federal Communications Commission to review policies allowing News Corp. to control multiple media outlets in the same market.
