Pity those of us who monitor the ups and downs of China’s popular microblog platform, Sina Weibo. For every story its users spread in defiance of local censorship, there follows a clampdown.

Whether it’s the latest strike against rumors, or real name registration, or newly banned keywords, there’s always another restriction in the works as the service struggles to keep a lid on sensitive conversations without driving away its user base. “China tightens grip on social media,” we might report, as the Financial Times did in April. And last October. (The U.K.-based newspaper also noted China’s grip tightening on lawyers in March.) It’s not that these headlines are misleading. They simply show how difficult it is to illustrate the grip that always tightens, but never quite suffocates.

View post:
Blog: Chinese microblog regulates, suspends users–again

The Edward R. Murrow Transmitting Station is the largest BBG transmission facility in the United States. This four minute video provides an introduction to its history and operations. Approximately 85% of the shortwave broadcasts from the Murrow Transmitting station in North Carolina are Radio Martí Spanish broadcasts to Cuba. The remaining programs include VOA Spanish to Latin America, along with English, Portuguese and French to Africa.

Worldwide, the BBG operates 84 transmitting sites, with a total of 182 transmitters plus nearly 1,400 affiliate stations in order to send broadcasts in 59 languages to audiences in more than 100 countries.

The video and the above description are from the BBG official website.

The report below is from BBG Watch.

Rep. Walter B. Jones

There was a gala celebration at the rededication of the Edward Murrow Transmission facility on May 2 in Greenville, NC.  Over 200 area residents attended and speakers inlcuded Casey Murrow, only son of Edward R. Murrow, along with BBG Governor Victor Ashe, US Congressman Walter Jones and IBB Director Dick Lobo.
 
Jones and Ashe pledged strong support for shortwave transmissions. Jones stressed the station is the only facility of its type in the US and important for reaching Cuba and Latin America.  Jones received a standing ovation at the start and end of his remarks.
 
Jones worked to keep the facility open against attempts by some BBG officials to close it down. He praised Ashe for getting the Murrow name restored to the station as well as his efforts to keep the facility open.

###

CPJ’s new analysis identifies Eritrea, North Korea, Syria, Iran as worst

Originally posted here:
10 Most Censored Countries

News of blind legal activist Chen Guangcheng has been censored for months. International news reports of his escape last week from incarceration in his home in Linyi, Shandong–apparently to U.S. protection, although his whereabouts remain unclear–has only intensified that censorship. That is unlikely to stop discussion among those familiar with Chen’s case.

Visit link:
Blog: Blind lawyer spurs news blackout in China

For the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), the federal agency that runs the Voice of America (VOA), Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) and other stations broadcasting news to the world with U.S. taxpayers’ money, the public opinion that matters is mostly abroad.

These stations provide uncensored news to many countries without free media and some, specifically the Voice of America, also represent the United States — the full spectrum of American opinions — as part of VOA’s mission. These stations are not in the public diplomacy business per se, but their news reporting and the image they project adds to the overall U.S. public diplomacy message in various countries.

If you are a foreign national and the news gets out that your U.S. government employer mistreats you and takes advantage of you, it’s not a good thing for America’s reputation abroad. Journalists talk to other journalists who in turn publish what they hear from their colleagues.

If the U.S. government employer claims that its activities reflect American values and help other nations transition to media freedom and democracy, the gap between actions and words becomes even more apparent.

The Broadcasting Board of Governors executive staff has never cared about such things. They have ignored the public impact of their actions for years as they continued to exploit foreign born and U.S. visa status journalists, denied them basic rights and got away with it until now.

But the news about their mistreatment of employees is now leaking out, bad press in many countries intensifies, and court cases pile up, including one at the European Human Rights Court in Strasbourg. Even pro-American foreign politicians speak out in defense of journalists mistreated and exploited by the BBG. This is not the kind of public diplomacy the U.S. needs. Yet, the BBG executive staff has remained unmoved.

But the tide may be turning against the BBG managers now working for the director of the International Broadcasting Bureau Richard Lobo. The fact that BBG employees rate their managers as being the worst leaders in the entire U.S. government, as reflected in the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) surveys, has caught the attention of BBG member Ambassador Victor Ashe. He started meeting with employees and urged other BBG members to do the same.

Ashe reported at the BBG meeting held last week in Miami that Board members have learned about management practices that were hidden in the closet for many years. He also said that Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs Tara Sonenshine, who represented Secretary of State Clinton at the BBG meeting in Miami, made valuable suggestions on public input into the Agency’s operations. Another BBG member Susan McCue suggested that instead of cutting programs, the management should look for savings in “management.” At the same meeting, the Board reversed their staff’s recommendation to eliminate Voice of America radio broadcasts to Tibet and to close down the VOA Cantonese Service. The decision to reverse the Tibet and China cuts was announced by Governor Michael Meehan.

It appears that BBG members are finally beginning to realize that they themselves have been the victims of their own staff which has been responsible for numerous blunders, such as the proposal to end VOA radio to Tibet, but also for constantly proposing to cut programs, expanding their own bureaucracy at the expense of programming, and exploiting foreign journalists to maintain their positions and power.

The scheme devised by BBG executives involves cutting or reducing broadcasts, firing regular employees and replacing them with contractors who are paid very little, are denied basic employment benefits and can’t defend themselves effectively against abuses by the management.

Thanks to Governor Ashe’s efforts, BBG members and IBB director Richard Lobo have been hearing from some of these contractors at the Voice of America. For the first time, BBG members have met with union representatives. As Governor Ashe said, they have learned things they would rather not hear about, but things they should know. Exploitation and discrimination of foreign-born contractors was one of many topics which were discussed.

But neither employees nor their union are convinced that the current top BBG/IBB managers can be reformed. Most recently, the union representing BBG employees, AFGE Local 1812, posted an item on its website on the continuec Agency’s abuse of its J-1 Visa status journalists. It reads:

“Every so often there is case that so perfectly illustrates the mistreatment of employees committed by the BBG/IBB/VOA management that it needs to be told. The way this management has mistreated people that they brought into this country via the inappropriate use of the J-1 Visa process (known for good reason as the “nanny visa”) is appalling. Unfortunately the example below is not a singular case. There have been others that this management has sent packing in a similar manner. These former employees now have a very low opinion of the United States Government; if not America itself (although it needs to be pointed out that Sumaira has not indicated any ill will towards anyone at this point). I believe that the BBG/IBB/VOA management, by treating their J-1 Visa holders the way they do, turn these once enthusiastic promoters of America and our values into less than enthusiastic admirers of this country. In this way the management under the BBG undermines the Voice of America’s purpose, at least to the extent that we are supposed to promote good will towards this country and our ideals. I cannot vouch for everything she states but I can state that when the head of the H.R. office was asked what would have happened if Sumaira left the country when she was first informed that her visa had expired, she me told that there would not have been a reconsideration appeal because the Agency would not sponsor her to bring her back. In addition, the deciding official who heard Sumaira’s appeal did not sign the decision letter. One has to wonder why. I was a witness to Sumaira’s appeal and believe a third party decision maker would have thrown out the Agency’s allegations completely. Read Sumaira’s account by clicking on the title of this story.” Agency Abuse of J-1 Visa

Snjezana Pelivan is suing RFE/RL and BBG at the European Court of Human Rights

Then there is the longstanding discrimination of foreign-born journalists employed as contractors by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty at their headquarters in Prague, the Czech Republic. The Broadcasting Board of Governors executives devised a scheme of depriving these journalists of the protections they could receive under the current Czech labor law. That way they can fire them at will without any explanation and they can do that — they claim — under the communist-era rules that exempted certain foreign employers (It used to be Soviet companies in communist-run Czechoslovakia.) from some of the local laws and regulations.

This cynical abuse of the Czech legal system by the BBG has been a public diplomacy disaster abroad for the United States, but somehow it escaped the attention of most U.S. media and U.S. public officials.

Anna Karapetian is suing RFE/RL in Czech courts

This scandal has, however, been reported on widely by foreign media in some of the countries where RFE/RL operates. One case of a former RFE/RL employee Snjezana Pelivan has reached the European Court of Human Rights. Another case filed by an Armenian journalist Anna Karapetian is being reviewed by the courts in the Czech Republic. Both plaintiffs are women. They claim they were denied the protections of the Czech labor law because they were foreigners employed and then dismissed by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty. RFE/RL was merely following personnel policies set by BBG executives.

The husband of one of the women, himself a distinguished former RFE/RL editor and commentator, wrote a letter about the impact of this BBG policy on America’s image abroad. He provided a list of foreign media titles highly negative toward the United States as they reported on these court cases. The letter was addressed to the newly sworn in Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy Tara Sonenshine.  The author of the letter Lev Roitman is the husband of Snjezana Pelivan whose case against RFE/RL and the BBG is pending before the European Court of Human Rights.  Roitman is a former RFE/RL senior commentator. He retired in 2005,after thirty years with RFE/RL in New York, Munich, and Prague.

“Please accept my congratulations on your confirmation by Senate as the next Undersecretary for Public Diplomacy. Hopefully, you will achieve better results for the United States than the kaleidoscope of your predecessors in that position.

 

In particular, the Secretary of State serves ex officio as a member of BBG and of RFE/RL’s

Board of Directors. You will represent her in that critical segment of U.S. public diplomacy.

For your predecessors, it was just a ceremonial and burdensome chore. The results of such a “leadership” (to use a politically correct word) are devastating to American image abroad.

 

Enclosed please find an Open Letter

At Broadcasting Board of Governors and Radio Free Europe/Liberty –Public Diplomacy is Public Scandal at Public Expense

It was delivered in hard copies to the listed addresses. On January 24th, the Open Letter was published and widely multiplied by Internet.

 

On January 27th, Mr. Walter Isaacson resigned as the BBG Chairman. Otherwise, nothing changed since then. Just the list of scandalous for the United States international publications (follows) grew longer. It is your task now to stop that cancerous grows of negative publicity.

 

I wish you real achievements in public diplomacy. You may start by confronting the self-serving BBG bureaucracy — for immediate benefit to our country.

 

“Abbreviated List of international publications (in Czech, Serbo-Croatian, English, Russian, Armenian, etc.) condemning RFE/RL discriminative personnel policies practiced in the Czech Republic”:

“At Broadcasting Board of Governors and Radio Free Europe/Liberty –

Public Diplomacy is Public Scandal at Public Expense,” 

“Snjezana Pelivan asks Croatian government to support her legal claim in Strasbourg,” 

“’Prague winter’ for USA’s Radio Free Europe/Liberty,”

“A Spectre (ghost) Haunts ‘Free Europe’ ,”

“A Letter from Prague: Two Women Fighting to Uphold America’s Principles at America’s Radio,”

“Samizdat at Radio Free Europe/ Liberty describes discrimination against foreigners, women,”

“American Radio Free Europe violates equal rights of its foreign employees in Prague,”

“U.S.-Funded Radio Free Europe Invokes Communist Law to Violate the Will of Congress,”

“American RFE/RL Fights in Courts against Armenian Journalist. And Scores Against America,”

“From RFE/RL: Immorality as a Matter of Policy,”

“Czech Court Rules Against RFE/RL in Suit by Dismissed Armenian Employee,”

“In handcuffs of ‘Liberty’,”

“Czech Court to American Radio Free Europe: No Use for U.S. Laws in the Czech Republic.         Hillary Clinton Will Not Be Asked to Testify,”

“Czech Court Rules RFE/RL Cannot Discriminate Against Its Own Foreign Journalists,”

“Radio Liberty Betrays Its Ideals,”

“Czech Supreme Court Rules Against Radio Free Europe. Karapetian’s Case Returned for New Consideration”,

“It’s the Morality, Stupid,”

“Radio Free Europe – Task for Czech Foreign Minister Karel Schwarzenberg,”

“Radio Free Europe – Guantanamo in Prague,”

“Armenian journalist appeals to Obama to Protect Rights of Foreign Journalists at U.S. Government-funded Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty,”  

“Equality With Precondition. Practice of Free Europe Contradicts Its Ideals,”

“U.S. Attorney General is Asked to Investigate Fraud at RFE/RL,”

“Doomsday of Radio Liberty. From Double Standards to Double Morals?”

“A Sense of Betrayal,”

“Czech Politician Accuses U.S. of Discrimination Against Foreign Journalists,”

“On Air in Legal Vacuum,”

“Czech MP Writes to U.S. Counterparts Over Work Conditions in RFE/RL,”

”New Administration Must Undo RFE/RL Anti-Diplomacy Abroad,”

“BBG, RFE/RL: Bring Public Diplomats Instead of Public Bureaucrats,”

“Don’t Feed Kremlin’s Public Diplomacy With U.S. Public Hypocrisy,”

“Public Disaster Instead of Public Diplomacy,”

“Cases of Karapetian and Pelivan as Morality Check for Obama Administration. Radio Free Europe to Face European Court of Human Rights,”

“Czech MP Questions Pelivan Case,”

“Czech Sovereignty Ends at RFE/RL,”

“At Radio Free Europe/Liberty, Bulk of Discriminated Employees is Muslims. Hillary Clinton Serves on Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Board of Directors,”

“Free Europe With Its Own Laws in Colonial Czech Republic?”  

“From Human Rights Show to Human Rights Court,”

“Prague Spring Leads to Strasbourg,”

”News Flashes From Radio Free/Radio Liberty. The Face of America Abroad,”

“Czech senator angry about Croat’s lawsuit”… “

CPJ’s 2012 Impunity Index spotlights countries
where journalists are slain and killers go free

The rest is here:
Getting Away With Murder

See the original post here:
China – Statement by the Liu Xiaobo Support Committee and Amnesty International France

Read more:
Empowering independent media: U.S. efforts to foster a free press and an open Internet

Tara Sonenshine

The Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) and International Broadcasting Bureau (IBB) executives who have embarrassed the Obama Administration by their decision to end Voice of America (VOA) radio broadcasts to Tibet will receive an early visit to VOA from the newly sworn-in Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs Tara D. Sonenshine.

BBG Watch has learned that the new Under Secretary for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs has accepted an invitation from the BBG to come by the Cohen Building early in her tenure.  Tara Sonenshine plans to attend the Board’s meeting this month at the Office of Cuba Broadcasting (OCB), but has also welcomed the chance to visit the agency’s headquarters as well as “the vaunted home of VOA,” as one BBG official with former links to the State Department described her planned Voice of America visit in an internal email.

Tara Sonenshine will see the Voice of America shortly before it may lose many of its broadcasting services, including VOA radio to Tibet, major parts of VOA English and Spanish, VOA Cantonese broadcasts and Internet Cantonese news to China, VOA Georgian radio and several other foreign language news operations. VOA would lose 170 professional front line broadcasters and producers in the proposed budget if it is passed by Congress.   VOA faces net cuts totaling $17 million, compared with a reduction of $731,000 for its sister network, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty.

These cuts to Voice of America operations are being advanced year after year by a small group of BBG and IBB strategic planners and executives. Despite strong bipartisan opposition in Congress to these cuts, they were approved again this year by the majority of part time BBG members with the notable exception of the senior Republican Ambassador Victor H. Ashe. He and Sonenshine are the only attendees of BBG board meetings with any substantive foreign policy and public diplomacy experience. Sonenshine will represent at these meetings Secretary of State Hillary Clinton who is an ex officio BBG member.

Tibetans protesting at BBG's Michael Lynton's LA Sony office against silencing of Voice of America radio broadcasts to Tibet by the Broadcasting Board of Governors.

A group of Tibetans and their supporters protested recently against the latest proposed VOA cuts at the Sony Pictures office of the BBG interim presiding chair Michael Lynton. Thousands of letters in support of VOA Tibetan radio broadcasts have been sent to members of Congress, some of whom want to save not only VOA Tibetan and Cantonese broadcasts but also VOA programs to other nations without free media, including Vietnam and Laos.

BBG and IBB executives who want to end these broadcasts claim that the Voice of America’s mission of representing the United States to the world can be done by the so-called surrogate broadcasters, semi-private entities such as Radio Free Asia (RFA), which are also managed by the BBG. Critics have charged, however, that these executives are also taking resources from the surrogate broadcasters to expand their own International Broadcasting Bureau bureaucracy. Their primary target, however, according to these critics, is the Voice of America, particularly reporting in foreign languages focusing on human rights issues. These BBG and IBB executives want to fire dozens of experienced VOA journalists, media freedom and human rights activists have warned.

Their measure of success, according to one critic, are VOA English lessons with high school bathroom humor that Chinese censors are inclined to ignore rather than providing hard-hitting radio and satellite television news of interest to specific groups such as political dissidents, human rights activists, ethnic and religious minorities and women who are victims of forced abortions. “They can’t survey these groups in an authoritarian nation like China and therefore videos with juvenile humor seem to them more appealing because they bring it an online audience that can be measured for as long as the Chinese censors allow it,” a critic said.

A letter addressed to Congresswoman Kay Granger (R – TX), Chairman of the Subcommittee on State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs of the House Committee on Appropriations and to Ranking Member Congresswoman Nita Lowey (D – NY) criticizes the Broadcasting Board of Governors for expanding their bureaucracy at the expense of critical overseas broadcasts and U.S. strategic interests:

The proposed reductions are driven not by a considered strategic world view, but by bureaucratic expedience and a fundamental misunderstanding of the mission of VOA. If the fiscal year 2013 proposal is enacted, the staff level for VOA will be reduced by 13.2% from the current year. In contrast, only 3.3% of the positions from the International Broadcasting Bureau (IBB), which provides administrative support to the BBG, will be cut. If the fiscal year 2013 proposal is enacted the number of full time equivalent (FTE) positions for the IBB will rise from 593.2 in fiscal year 2011 to 678.2. In the same time period VOA will lose 121.2 FTE positions. The general trend of the IBB has been to grow larger while the number of language services they support is being reduced. Broadcasting should be the last thing to be cut. It makes little sense to grow the bureaucracy while cutting that which it is meant to support. The eliminations and reductions in broadcasting to Tibet, China, Laos, and Vietnam alone will cut 28 positions from VOA.

Link to the Letter

Here is the schedule of Tara Sonenshine’s planned visit to the BBG and Voice of America headquarters, as described in an internal email:

The new Under Secretary for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs, Tara Sonenshine, has accepted an invitation from the BBG to come by the Cohen Building early in her tenure.  She plans to attend the Board’s meeting this month at OCB, but has also welcomed the chance to visit the agency’s headquarters as well as the vaunted home of VOA.

This she will do next Tuesday, April 10, from 11 a.m. to 1:30 p.m.  The program agreed upon with the State Department will be:

11 a.m. to noon – reception with light refreshments, VOA Briefing Room.

Among the invitees will be the language service heads and senior congressional staff who handle public diplomacy issues.

Noon to 12:30 – Tailored tour taking in historic aspects of the building as well as state-of-the-art studios.  Possible TV interview, to be worked out with VOA; tape would be shared across entities.

12:30 to 1:30 – Informal lunch, pre-ordered individually for those who choose to participate.  Details to follow.

The program will end in time for a brief break before the 2 p.m. Strategy and Budget Committee meeting.

Unlike most top level BBG and IBB executives, Tara Soneshine has extensive public diplomacy experience and is believed to be sensitive to human rights issues. Some who know her believe than she may be more involved in BBG decision making process.

Here is her official State Department bio:

Biography

Tara D. Sonenshine
Under Secretary
Term of Appointment: 04/05/2012 to present
Tara D. Sonenshine was sworn in as Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs on April 5, 2012.

Tara was formerly Executive Vice President of the United States Institute of Peace. Prior to joining the United States Institute of Peace, she was a strategic communications adviser to many international organizations including USIP, the International Crisis Group, Internews, CARE, The American Academy of Diplomacy, and the International Women’s Media Foundation. Ms. Sonenshine served in various capacities at the White House during the Clinton Administration, including Transition Director and Director of Foreign Policy Planning for the National Security Council and Special Assistant to the President and Deputy Director of Communications for the NSC.

Tara has had a distinguished career in communications and government, with high-level experience in broadcast, print, and online media. She has produced news programs for network television and authored numerous articles for national print and online media. She is the recipient of 10 News Emmy Awards and other awards in journalism for broadcast programs on domestic and international issues.

Tara graduated from Tufts University in 1981 Phi Beta Kappa with a B.A. in political science. She has remained active at Tufts on boards and advisory committees including the Tisch College of Citizenship and Public Service.

Her broadcast career began at ABC News in New York, working for another Tufts alumnus, David Burke, then vice president of ABC NEWS. Ms. Sonenshine went on to become editorial producer of ABC News’ Nightline, where she worked for more than a decade. She was also an off-air reporter at the Pentagon for ABC’s World News Tonight. A former contributing editor for Newsweek, Sonenshine is the author of numerous articles on foreign affairs published in the New York Times, Washington Post, and other newspapers.

Her hobbies include family time, tennis, Zumba, writing about foreign policy and global women’s issues.

The Broadcasting Board of Governors and Gallup held an event to discuss how the world’s populations perceive media freedom in their countries. It appears, however, that Gallup employees are not exactly big fans of free speech. The Tibetan woman is presumably a US taxpayer. The BBG plans to give Gallup millions of dollars of US taxpayers’ money to pay for audience research, which critics argue cannot be conducted reliably in countries like China and Tibet. The Tibetan woman made that point while stressing the critical importance of VOA radio broadcasts for the people in Tibet.

BBG member Michael Meehan, who was one of the panelists, had to intervene to allow the Tibetan woman to finish her statement as she was being repeatedly interrupted by a Gallup executive. Our sources suspect that International Broadcasting Bureau (IBB) officials may have instructed Gallup executives to try to silence any anti-BBG protesters at the event.

Gallup has received a $50 million  contract from the BBG to provide it with audience research.

You can watch the video of the panel here or on the Gallup website: Gallup Event: Measuring Media Freedom Worldwide

The Tibetan woman can be heard in the last 15 minutes of the video.

The continued flow of information from people in the know concerning the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) and concurrently the International Broadcasting Bureau (IBB) is cause for grave concern about continued American strategic, public diplomacy and humanitarian interests in various countries in the world especially, countries like Tibet where wanton desecration of its people is the cultural genocidal policy of China as well as China itself, where human rights and freedoms are denied in every part of one’s existence.

For these active efforts on the part of the BBG to decimate the Voice of America (VOA) and its other offshoot broadcasting entities one is reminded of there being something rotten in the state of the BBG. It isn’t just a lack of vital knowledge or even understanding about what the VOA and the BBG’s surrogate broadcasting grantees are all about, it seems more to be a contrived effort to eliminate America’s influence and presence around the world and especially in those countries where it is the sole light in people’s lives.

It is becoming clearer by the day that in spite of the simple fact that the BBG is completely out of touch and worse, has no real interest in knowing what, who, how and why the VOA has operated so successfully for seventy years. Its strange actions would appear to be herded from some other source which has a vested interest in eliminating American influence.

There is considerable evidence provided by the Obama administration that America has many things it should apologize for but rarely mentions those which have provided millions of people with hope , inspiration and a belief in liberty, freedom and justice for all — the bedrock of America’s dreams and accomplishments.

It is of deep concern that Congress has not acted in a more rapid process to stop what the BBG is doing in its tracks, completely, not just for the short term.

Whenever there has been a consolidation of entities such as for instance what the BBG wants to do, place Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL), Middle East Broadcasting Networks (MBN) and Radio Free Asia (RFA) under one umbrella — ostensibly to save money and end duplication, supposedly — it becomes very clear in short order that what was intended is an unwieldy bubble with no direction. Incapable bureaucrats with even less information upon which to make decisions take over and for all intents and purposes the fundamental reason for the whole operation is lost and done away with entirely.

This is the track that the incompetents at the Broadcasting Board of Governors and the International Broadcasting Bureau seem to be on and America will definitely regret the day that these individuals were in a position of authority to exercise such insane judgement in a world where freedom, liberty and human rights are being torn apart.

One only needs look at the horrible attacks on Jews and Christians in many parts of the world and their right to exist being driven off the map of humanity. At no other time in America’s history, except for during the Second World War, has its influence, care, generosity and hope been more necessary than now. So the question remains, and it requires a very solid response. Why is the BBG attempting to tear down what has been operating exceptionally well for over seventy years?

The namby pamby answers from the BBG, such as saving money and eliminating duplication, just don’t answer the question and in no way are even reasonable or sound. While some may believe that the Cold War is over, most know that in a different form it is just heating up in many parts of the world. It is a frightening thought to realize that Christians and Jews are being killed just for the heck of it, without a viable response by radio broadcasts from America.

Now is the time — not later, or sometime in the future, but now — for Congress to act in a direct, concise and patriotic manner to save the agency and the Voice of America from demolition by a group of know nothings, care nothings, who themselves are so self-absorbed they have no idea what is required of America in order to maintain its influence and humanity for millions around the world.

by Quo Vadis 

In November 2011, at a forum sponsored by the Public Diplomacy Council and reported on by Adam Clayton Powell III, participants heard that the newest 2011 VOA audience figures showed an increase of 22 million for the international broadcasting audience in comparison with 2010.  Good news, of course, and fast on the heels of a brand-spanking-new Strategic Plan unveiled just a month prior and authored by the IBB spokesman at the forum, the Director of the Office of Strategic Planning and Performance Measurement of the United States Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG).

In those 2011 VOA audience figures, “the biggest success on the planet” is how the IBB spokesman described U.S. broadcasting in Afghanistan.  Evidently, the data showed three-quarters of the entire country watches or listens to American broadcasts. Additionally, 400,000 Afghans subscribe to BBG text messaging services. According to available research data, less than half of the population in Afghanistan has a TV and only a tiny minuscule has access to the Internet. Therefore, it would not be difficult to deduce that radio, for the time being, is by far the most powerful medium in the country to reach potential listeners.
 
In reaction to the news about the impact and popularity of U.S. broadcasting in Afghanistan, the BBG/IBB in its FY-2013 budget submission decided to cut those evidently powerful VOA radio broadcasts to Afghanistan while proposing to release eight seasoned VOA broadcasters. In so doing is the Agency, as some wonder, transferring the functions away from VOA’s federal employees to the RFE/RL surrogate grantee, thereby opening up the back door to de-federalization?   

That non-sequitur in deciding to cut VOA Afghan broadcasts in spite of their importance and popularity is rivaled by the announcement in the FY-2013 budget that VOA will cut most of its English-language broadcasts to the world including China and the Middle East. This decision ignores the fact that according to some, English is or should be the official language of the United States, remains the language of diplomacy, culture, and commerce in the world as well as being the second language of choice for millions of people around the globe from Albania to Zambia. One can only wonder if the BBC, plus Radio Canada International and Radio Australia, perhaps inspired by the daring VOA example, will soon cut its English-language broadcasts to the world as well. 

At the Public Diplomacy forum, there came a “medium is the message” a la Marshall McLuhan moment when the IBB spokesman stated: “Impact cannot be reduced to audience, but you cannot have impact without audience,” adding that broadcasting needs to look at specific audiences – not just traditional elites, but young people and women.” Actually, the Voice of America has been doing that for many years, informing audiences with the latest news and commentary and tailoring its back-half features to the diverse interests of its listeners with programming aimed at a cross-section of the listening audience: farmers, students, teachers, engineers, politicians, elites, business people, young/old, men/women, rich and poor. In its music programs, the VOA of the not-too-distant past  broadcast the full spectrum of American music: opera and classical music, country, Broadway, folk, pop, rock, hip-hop, blues, jazz and never concentrated solely on rock and pop music, as in Radio Sawa to the Middle East, as if that were the only musical genre produced in America.

Beyond audience growth, another goal of the Strategic Plan, said its author, is for VOA and other U.S. broadcasters to embrace user content and use material created by listeners and viewers. According to the IBB spokesman at the forum, the “value added” by U.S. international broadcasting would be checking and verifying the accuracy of material submitted by the audience. Unfortunately, the “check-and-verify” concept was challenged by the recent gaffe of the VOA Russian website which published a completely fictitious interview supposedly with a leader of the anti-Putin dissident movement in Moscow, Alexei Navalny, who announced to the world that the VOA interview was totally bogus and conducted via cyberspace with an impostor. “Value added” is a slippery slope, indeed.

One questioner at the PD forum said he could not find the phrase “public diplomacy” anywhere in the Strategic Plan.  “Correct,” said the Strategic Plan author, the reason being:  “Objective journalists by and large, don’t subscribe to the idea that they are changing people’s attitudes,” continuing that “attitudinal and behavioral change is the hope, but not a direct goal.”  And the explanation finished with:  “we don’t do the advocacy piece. Good things will come from good journalism.”  

Crystal-clear.  Forget the WHAM (Winning Hearts and Minds) factor.

That comment is in sharp contrast to the words of the distinguished public diplomacy expert, Walter Roberts, whom many credit with being one of the founding fathers of VOA. At the recent 70th birthday celebration of VOA, Walter Roberts stated: As the information revolution proceeds, diplomacy will become much more public diplomacy and public diplomacy cannot exist without international broadcasting. When I predict that in 30 years the Voice of America will exist, I also predict that Deustche Welle will also exist, that the BBC will exist because international broadcasting is a vital part of public diplomacy.”

Although public diplomacy was indeed omitted in the latest Strategic Plan, former BBG Chairman, Walter Isaacson, placed international broadcasting at the center of our national security. In his remarks when the Strategic Plan was unveiled, Mr. Isaacson said: “Our media outlets – VOA, RFE/Radio Liberty, Alhurra TV and Radio Sawa, RFA, and Radio/TV Marti – are a vital, cost-effective national security asset, whose impact is felt by some 166 million people weekly across the globe where critical U.S. interests are at stake.”

That difference of opinion is reflected in the current state of affairs at the BBG/IBB where there is an obvious disconnect about the true mission of international broadcasting between upper management and some middle-managers together with most of the rank-and-file.  Over the past few years, that disconnect is also obvious with the U.S. Congress which has consistently overruled the plans of the BBG/IBB in the national interest and the interests of national security.

The VOA ensemble trudges on and plays its heart out in spite of who happens to be the leader or conductor at any given time. Many directors embraced their duties conducting the VOA ensemble with enthusiasm, earning respect and admiration; others were indifferent or perceived the employees as a bothersome and unruly bunch, preferring to keep interaction to a minimum. Regardless of whether the Director was a gem or a lemon or whether upper management knew the score or didn’t, the broadcasting band continued to play on and does so now until such time as its voice will be silenced.

Not much different from the musicians in this video playing Dance of the Comedians from Smetana’s “The Bartered Bride” with the irrepressible rascal, Victor Borge, at the podium.

Link to Video

Monday and Tuesday more than a hundred Tibetan-Americans and Tibet-supporters will convene in Washington, DC to raise Tibet with their Senators and Representatives. With a few clicks you can help amplify their message today. Please join us and send a message to Capitol Hill that constituents across the country care about Tibet.

Every message counts! Please send one today—and encourage your friends and family to do so as well by tweeting about #TibetLobbyDay and posting this on Facebook.

To send the letter to your Congressional Representative and Your Senators CLICK HERE.

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SAMPLE LETTER

Members of Congress,

I write to thank you and your colleagues in Congress for a record of leadership on Tibetan issues and a commitment to provide programmatic and political support for Tibetans in exile and in Tibet.

Tibet is in crisis today. The Tibetan people are taking great risks to speak out for freedom and the return of the Dalai Lama. In response, Chinese security forces have imposed virtual martial law in many Tibetan areas, imposed a communications blackout, and blocked foreign journalists from reporting on the situation. It is vital that Congress and the international community help give Tibetans a voice.

Tibetan-Americans and Tibet supporters live in communities across the country. We recognize that the Chinese government has a well-funded and sophisticated lobby operation in Washington, D.C. But we are empowered by the unflinching courage of six million Tibetans who struggle against Chinese oppression every day and by the leadership of His Holiness the Dalai Lama whose life’s work is the advancement of non-violence, human-dignity and a just solution for Tibet.

Congressional leaders from Speaker Boehner to Senator Feinstein have stood next to His Holiness the Dalai Lama and pledged their solidarity with the Tibetan cause, and Presidents Obama and Bush have publicly supported the Dalai Lama’s approach.

At this time of crisis, concerted Congressional action will signal to Tibetans and Chinese that the world is listening.

You can show your support for Tibet by:
1. (Senate) Cosponsor S. Res. 356, calling on the Chinese government to end its crackdown and address the legitimate grievances of the Tibetan people.
>> Bipartisan resolution (Feinstein-McCain-Lieberman) urges Chinese officials to end repressive policies targeting Tibetans and allow unrestricted access to foreign journalists and diplomats to Tibet.

2. Preserve Voice of America Tibetan radio broadcasting, and sustain funding for other Tibet support programs in the Foreign Operations Appropriations bill.
>> VOA radio, proposed for elimination, offers perhaps the only uncensored source of world news in Tibet, due to the Chinese government’s severe restrictions on media.
>> The other small but indispensable investments in Tibetan communities support the Dalai Lama’s vision of preserving the Tibetan identity until a political solution is achieved.

3. Update the Tibetan Policy Act of 2002 to respond to new developments in Tibet and within the Tibetan exile community.
>> New legislation should (a) articulate a relationship with the democratically-elected Central Tibetan Administration, (b) take a clear position that the reincarnation/succession of the Dalai Lama is up to him and the Tibetan people, not the Chinese government, (c) require the State Department to establish a consulate in Lhasa, Tibet, (d) urge a multi-lateral approach to resolving the Tibet issue and (e) include objection to forced resettlement of Tibetan nomads in “Tibet Project Principles.”

4. Advocate on behalf of Tibetan political prisoners, including Dhondup Wangchen, Lobsang Tenzin, Tenzin Delek Rinpoche, Runggye Adak, Norzin Wangmo and Gendun Choekyi Nyima (Panchen Lama).
>> See www.savetibet.org for more information

5. (House) Cosponsor immigration legislation, H.R. 699 to provide 3,000 immigrant visas to qualified Tibetans over a 3-year period.
>> This bill (Sensenbrenner-George Miller), would further the Dalai Lama’s goal of helping preserve Tibetan culture in exile. Immigrants would be easily absorbed by established Tibetan-American communities.

Thank you for your support for Tibet.

Sincerely,

[ NAME ]

The Dalai Lama said that Voice of America Tibetan radio is “vital medicine” for Tibetans, and the Tibetan people consider it as one of the most valuable and priceless gifts from the people and government of the United States to them.

Sign a Petition Save Voice of America Radio to Tibet

The Broadcasting Board of Governors Chief Financial Officer Maryjean Buhler pointed out at last week’s public board meeting that the BBG proposes in its fiscal year 2013 budget a reduction rather than an elimination of the Voice of America Tibetan Service.

The BBG proposal means, however, an elimination of the entire VOA Tibetan radio broadcasting service, leaving only a VOA Tibetan website and a VOA Tibetan television program. Neither of these can be viewed easily in Tibet due to the Chinese regime’s draconian restrictions on private ownership of satellite dishes and its effective blocking of VOA websites. This means that the VOA Tibetan Service would be reduced to providing news only to Tibetans living in exile rather than to Tibetans in Tibet, where the Voice of America is most needed and its radio programs are secretly listen to as reported recently by National Public Radio.

This video from last Thursday’s BBG board meeting includes comments by CFO Maryjean Buhler and BBG Governor Victor Ashe who is said to oppose cutting Voice of America radio broadcasts to Tibet. Ashe said that he received numerous protests and indicated that BBG members are taking another look at this matter.

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This document is reposted from savevoatibetanradio.com website.

Stop the Voice of America’s Tibetan Language Radio from going silent for the Tibetan people

In the FY2013 budget proposal, the Broadcasting Board of Governors plans on eliminating the Voice of America’s Tibetan language radio to Tibet.

The Tibetan People are burning with anguish and pain at this moment

This comes at a period when Tibet is literally burning, and China’s repression and crackdowns on the Tibetan people are at their harshest and most violent. Twenty five young people, mostly monks and  nuns, have self-immolated to draw attention to the attacks  on Tibetan religion and culture. China’s response has been to crackdown harder, conduct beatings and detentions and inflict painful and humiliating ‘re-education’ programs at Tibetan religious institutions.

Wrong political message to the Chinese Communist Party

Cutting this lifeline for Tibetans in their hour of need sends a wrong message to China. China will understand it to mean that decimation of Tibetan religion and culture, and indeed their very identity, will now be overlooked by America. And to the Tibetan people, it will be a heartbreaking blow from a nation that Tibetans love, respect, and consider a friend in stormy weather.

        VOA Tibetan language radio is a unique source of information for Tibetans

A recent NPR report on the Tibetan self-immolations in Tibet said, “The monks listen secretly to Voice of America’s Tibetan service news every night, despite feeling almost physical pain at the bleak news.” That’s because ever since 1991, when the Voice of America was mandated by an act of Congress to start its Tibetan language service, it has been the only international broadcast into Tibet that provides world news, US news, the activities and efforts of the Dalai Lama for his people, and information and analysis on the workings of the free world to Tibet. And today, VOA Tibetan radio is still the only one that gives all of that to the Tibetan people.

Shortwave radio is still a powerful medium in Tibet

Shortwave radio remains a cheap, easily concealed, and thus the safest mode of getting news and information in Tibet. Radio signals are jammed by the Chinese in town centers, but in the rural areas where the vast majority of Tibetans live, Voice of America’s radio is loud and clear.

The Dalai Lama said that Voice of America Tibetan radio is “vital medicine” for Tibetans, and the Tibetan people consider it as one of the most valuable and priceless gifts from the people and government of the United States to them.

Save VOA Tibetan radio on behalf of the millions of Tibetans living under extreme oppression, and the American people who have supported the plight of the Tibetans for over 50 years.

Here is the original post:
Beset by online surveillance and content filtering, netizens fight on

Tibetan spiritual leader Dalai Lama congratulates the Voice of America (VOA) on its 70th anniversary, but the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) and the Obama Administration plan to eliminate VOA radio broadcasts to Tibet.

As the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) plans to eliminate and reduce numerous Voice of America (VOA) broadcasting services as part of the Obama Administration proposed budget for fiscal year 2013, VOA celebrated 70 years of broadcasting this year, and marked this milestone on Wednesday, March 7th, with a special event at VOA headquarters in Washington, DC. High points of the afternoon included video tributes from President Barack Obama, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Burmese pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi, and the Dalai Lama.

One of the services the Broadcasting Board of Governors wants to eliminate are Voice of America Tibetan radio broadcasts. Ambassador Victor Ashe is the only BBG member who publicly spoke up against cutting VOA radio programs to Tibet, but sources tell us that other Board members are now also questioning their staff’s recommendation and the Board’s budget decision on Tibet. The BBG also wants to eliminate the VOA Cantonese Service and to reduce VOA broadcasting to Vietnam, Laos and other countries without free media while preserving its administrative and bureaucratic overhead. The BBG also proposes large cuts in English and Spanish programs and broadcasting jobs.

Critics of the Broadcasting Board of Governors are pointing out that BBG members have allowed their staff to expand bureaucratic positions at the International Broadcasting Bureau (IBB) run by President Obama’s friend Richard Lobo while cutting Voice of America broadcasts and positions of VOA broadcasters and journalists. In a letter to U.S. Congress, one critic wrote:

The proposed reductions are driven not by a considered strategic world view, but by bureaucratic expedience and a fundamental misunderstanding of the mission of VOA. If the fiscal year 2013 proposal is enacted, the staff level for VOA will be reduced by 13.2% from the current year. In contrast, only 3.3% of the positions from the International Broadcasting Board (IBB), which provides administrative support to the BBG, will be cut. If the fiscal year 2013 proposal is enacted the number of full time equivalent (FTE) positions for the IBB will rise from 593.2 in fiscal year 2011 to 678.2. In the same time period VOA will lose 121.2 FTE positions. The general trend of the IBB has been to grow larger while the number of language services they support is being reduced. Broadcasting should be the last thing to be cut. It makes little sense to grow the bureaucracy while cutting that which it is meant to support. The eliminations and reductions in broadcasting to Tibet, China, Laos, and Vietnam alone will cut 28 positions from VOA.

Link to Obama VOA 70th Anniversary Video

Link to Clinton VOA 70th Anniversary Video

Link to Dalai Lama VOA 70th Anniversary Video

Link to Aung San Suu Kyi VOA 70th Anniversary Video

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Russia – Draft electoral law provision threatens freedom of expression

Read the original post:
Russia – Human Rights Watch calls for an end to intimidation of activists, media as election nears

Beijing-based blogger Woeser reported on her website Invisible Tibet today that she has been confined to her residence by Beijing public security officers who are stationed outside her home. Woeser, an outspoken critic of Chinese government policies in Tibet, has recently written about a series of recent self-immolations among monks and arrests
of writers in western China.

The following is a guest commentary which takes a look at how the Chinese authorities and a U.S. federal government agency adopted a similar approach to media use of the Cantonese language.

IF IT WALKS LIKE A DUCK AND QUACKS LIKE A DUCK, IT’S NOT A CHICKEN

News Commentary by Quo Vadis

In a statement issued  February 13, 2012 announcing its budget request for 2013,  the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) trumpeted sweeping cuts of English and language broadcasts and a reduction of almost 200 jobs at its flagship station, the Voice of America, this year celebrating its 70th, and as many believe, its final anniversary.  
 
Among the VOA broadcasts facing obliteration:  the Cantonese Service which has been on the air since February of 1939 when the United States began  its link with the people in China who speak Cantonese by providing them with news broadcasts and then programs to promote freedom and democracy. Its role was reaffirmed by Public Law 94-350 which established the VOA Charter. 
 
In its announcement, the BBG, as justification for its decision, stated: “as Mandarin and Cantonese are the same written language, VOA will reach Cantonese listeners on its website.”  There is a slight problem with this assertion.  

Without going into the language of linguists who use exotic-for-the-general-public words like logographic, semanto-phonetic and morphophonemic, let’s break it down in more understandable terms:  

Written Chinese uses Classical and Standard characters. Both Cantonese and Mandarin speakers can read Classical Chinese.   Standard Chinese is based on the Mandarin dialect with vocabulary drawn from Mandarin speech. Therefore, the BBG is partly correct in saying that Mandarin and Cantonese speakers can both READ the classical WRITTEN Chinese language.  However, (and it’s quite a significant “however”), written and spoken Cantonese is almost completely different from written and spoken Mandarin because Cantonese is essentially a different language in its spoken form. 
 
So, in short, according to linguists, with some variations, this is basically how it goes:
​     
Mandarin speakers can read Standard Written Chinese (Mandarin) but not Written Cantonese.

Mandarin speakers understand Spoken Mandarin but generally don’t understand Spoken Cantonese although there are some Mandarin speakers who can.

Cantonese speakers can read Written Chinese (Mandarin) and their own Written Cantonese.

Some Cantonese speakers can understand Spoken Mandarin but all understand Spoken Cantonese. 

Boiled down to more understandable terms:

A Cantonese speaker and a Mandarin speaker can look at the exact same written text and understand what it says.  But ask them to read it out loud, and it’s the proverbial duck talking to the chicken.
 
That’s a bit different from the BBG statement which calls for a faulty and suspect conclusion to justify an action that they have taken with little or no research as to its validity and complexity.
 
Essentially, the BBG decision means that the approximately 60+ million speakers of Cantonese in mainland China which includes the large provinces of Guangdong and Guangxi  as well as the predominantly Cantonese-speaking population (7 million) of Hong Kong plus another half-million in Macau will be deprived of news and information from the United States of America. 
 
Not only information from America.  The central communist government in Beijing decided that as of March 1st of 2012, domestic radio and TV Cantonese broadcasts to the mainly Cantonese-speaking populous province of Guangdong will disappear (broadcasters will have to apply for permission to broadcast).  
 
This latest move against media use of Cantonese comes after the government proposed switching prime-time programming on Guangdong TV’s main channels from Cantonese to Mandarin in 2010. Implementation was postponed when the decision triggered mass demonstrations by Cantonese speakers, demonstrations so intense that the VOA covered them in its English-language broadcasts. 

Keeping VOA Cantonese broadcasts alive could and should be a strategic decision by the BBG in order to maintain and moreover, to increase listenership among a population now deprived of media in its own language.  
 
In the olden days of VOA, issues such as these were discussed and debated prior to implementation.  Not so now. Unfortunately, trying to point these facts out to the members of the Broadcasting Board of Governors and their executive staff is akin to speaking Mandarin to a Cantonese and vice versa:  quack-quack to cluck-cluck: like a duck talking to a chicken.
 

View original post here:
Russia – Wave of attempts to intimidate independent media in run-up to presidential election

Technology has democratized news publishing, rattling regimes that see their survival dependent on control of information. Video footage of repression from Burma to Syria to Egypt dramatically illustrates the benefits of Internet platforms and social media. Yet the Arab uprisings of 2011 also demonstrate the urgent need for providers and users of digital tools to understand the dangers of deploying them in repressive nations. As threats to online journalists grow in scope and frequency, they also underscore CPJ’s mandate to be a truly global organization. More journalists need CPJ’s help than ever before.

Original post:
Attacks on the Press in 2011: Preface

Trade and the Internet are turning us into global citizens, but the news we need to ensure accountability is often stopped at national borders. China is ramping up censorship, Iran is jailing dozens of journalists, and Turkey is using nationalist laws to stifle critical reporting. In Mexico criminals are dictating the news, while in Pakistan shadowy agents are attacking investigative reporters. Attacks on the Press analyzes press conditions and documents new dangers in dozens of countries worldwide.

Visit link:
Attacks on the Press in 2011

How does one negotiate the choice to stay and report potentially dangerous news, rather than take a less risky assignment, leave the profession, or flee the country? The recipients of the 2011 International Press Freedom Awards explain. By Kristin Jones

Originally posted here:
Attacks on the Press in 2011: Profiles in Freedom

The global rate of unpunished murders remains stubbornly high at just below 90 percent. Senior officials in the most dangerous countries are finally acknowledging the problem — the first step in what will be a long, hard battle. By Elisabeth Witchel

View original post here:
Attacks on the Press in 2011: Fighting Impunity

Legislation for Internet security can quickly turn into a weapon against the free press. Cybercrime laws are intended to extend existing penal codes to the online world, but they can easily be broadened to criminalize standard journalistic practices. By Danny O’Brien

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Attacks on the Press in 2011: Regulating the Internet

Even as trade and new systems of communication turn us into global citizens, the information we need to ensure accountability often stops at national borders. New platforms like social media are valuable tools, but the battle against censorship is hardly over. By Joel Simon

Excerpt from:
Attacks on the Press in 2011: The Global Citizen

The much-publicized assault on Lara Logan put the danger of sexual violence for journalists into the spotlight for the first time. As a result, there is more open discussion between reporters and news managers, but still too few preventative steps. By Lauren Wolfe

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Attacks on the Press in 2011: The Changing Views on Sexual Assault

The danger of covering violent street protests has become a significant risk for journalists, alongside combat and targeted killings. Sexual assault, organized crime, and digital vulnerability are also hazards. The security industry is struggling to keep up. By Frank Smyth

See the article here:
Attacks on the Press in 2011: Evolution in Journalist Security

Analyses and data chart press freedom conditions throughout the region. Mohamed Keita examines the false choice between development and press freedom, while Tom Rhodes probes an unsolved murder in Kenya that reverberates worldwide.

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Attacks on the Press in 2011: Africa

The Mexican president promised to protect a besieged press corps with a federal protection program, a special prosecutor and new legislation making anti-press violence a federal crime. But Felipe Calderón Hinojosa has failed at nearly every turn. By Mike O’Connor

Original post:
Attacks on the Press in 2011: In Mexico, Silence or Death Remains the Choice

In some Latin American countries, state-owned media are used not only for propaganda but as platforms to smear critics, including journalists. Some elected leaders have even invested in large multimedia holdings to further their agendas. By Carlos Lauría

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Attacks on the Press in 2011: State Media As Anti-Media Tool

Analyses and data chart press freedom conditions throughout the region. Carlos Lauría describes the rise of state media as a powerful propaganda tool. Mike O’Connor exposes Mexico’s failed efforts to combat deadly violence against the press.

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Attacks on the Press in 2011: Americas

This video companion to Attacks on the Press recounts the story of Mexican journalist Javier Valdez Cárdenas, who works in one of the world’s most dangerous places. (3:26)

Read the Attacks on the Press 2011 country profile on Mexico.

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Attacks on the Press in 2011: Working in Peril

New York, February 16, 2012–The Committee to Protect Journalists is deeply saddened by the death of New York Times foreign correspondent Anthony Shadid, a towering figure in international crisis reporting. Shadid perished following an apparent asthma attack while on assignment in Syria.

Continued here:
CPJ mourns the death of journalist Anthony Shadid