Reggie Littlejohn, Women's Rights Without Frontiers president. Photo by Lisa Keating.

“I believe that the VOA Mandarin Service has been singled out for the chopping block precisely because of its effectiveness – it has been the leading international broadcaster into China for nearly 70 years and has an enormous following inside China. VOA has been a thorn in the side of the Chinese Communist Party by exposing, for example, the persecution of human rights lawyers and the use of forced abortion to enforce China’s hated One Child Policy. My interview about China’s One Child Policy on VOA’s Mandarin Service generated an ardent and wide-ranging discussion, in which people from all over China called in to comment and discuss. The interview gave Chinese citizens a national forum in which to debate passionately held beliefs – an opportunity they otherwise would not have had, but for VOA.”

Reggie Littlejohn speaks at the Capitol Hill Press Conference on Chinese Human Rights of 1/18/11. Also pictured (from the right) are Congressman Chris Smith, Geng He, wife of Gao Zhisheng, and Bob Fu, President of China Aid.