page_title: Doha News
section_title: Development history
hierarchical_section_title: Doha News / Development history
caption_attribution_description: English: In an engaging presentation, Khatri reflected on her experience with blogging.
context_page_description: Doha News is an online news blog started in March 2009 by two American journalists, Shabina Khatri and Omar Chatriwala. It is based in Qatar and provides its readers with daily reports on breaking domestic and international news stories. It gained considerable popularity in May 2012 when it became the first news outlet in Qatar to report on the Villagio Mall fire.
context_section_description: In March 2009, Shabina Khatri created the Doha News account on Twitter. She and her husband, Omar Chatriwala, went on to launch a stand-alone website. It was the first digital news outlet established in the country. They have stated that their aim is to create a media platform in which they could engage the audience in a manner dissimilar to traditional forms of media.
  Doha News quickly increased in popularity due to its coverage of controversial local events not as widely reported in government-run media, with a notable instance being the May 2012 Villagio Mall fire in which 19 people were killed. It succeeded in obtaining and releasing verifiable figures and facts, such as the identities of the victims of the fire, whereas many other forms of online media reported unverified rumors. It experienced a massive increase in visitors during the event, increasing from about 10,000 visitors a day to 100,000 visitors a day. On the contrary, traditional media was criticized for its late and minimal coverage of the incident.
  Another sensitive story published by the website centered on the rape and prosecution of Qatari resident Marte Dalelv in the United Arab Emirates. It was not mentioned in print media, but appeared in international publications such as The New York Times after Doha News published a news article on the case. Similarly, after the murder of Lauren Patterson in October 2013, it was the most notable Qatari media outlet to report on the killing and some of its work was quoted in international newspapers.
caption: Shabina Khatri, founder of Doha News, giving a presentation on her experience with blogging.
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