After the outgoing president of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) Steven Korn fired last September dozens of some of the best and most respected independent journalists in Russia and replaced them with Masha Gessen and her team of largely unknown feature magazine writers, he assured the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) that the controversy he created and the public diplomacy crisis in Russia would blow over in two weeks.
Korn and Gessen dismissed protests from famous Russian human rights and political opposition leaders like Lyudmila Alexeeva and Mikhail Gorbachev, but the controversy only intensified and attracted even more media attention, first mostly in Russia and in some of the former Soviet republics, and then in the United States.
The BBG Watch’s far from complete List of Russian and International Media Reports on the Radio Liberty Crisis has now well over 400 items.
One of the more interesting recent reports is from the state-run Voice of Russia.
No ‘soft journalism’ for Radio Liberty, Voice of Russia, Jan. 22, 2013.
The Voice of Russia report describes the appeal to the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) and the designated interim RFE/RL president Kevin Klose from fired and current Radio Liberty Russian Service journalists who are defending their reputation.
BBG Watch List of Russian and International Media Reports on the Radio Liberty Crisis, January 23, 2013.