At the meeting of the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) in Miami on April 20, the federal agency in charge of U.S. international broadcasting decided to reverse its earlier decision on Voice of America (VOA) program cuts to China and Tibet. In expressing his full support for restoring funding for these broadcasts, BBG Governor Ambassador Victor Ashe said: This will…
Public Diplomacy
Annette Lantos pleads with Broadcasting Board of Governors to save Voice of America broadcasts
Annette Lantos, the wife of the late Congressman Tom Lantos, has joined efforts to oppose the Broadcasting Board of Governors’ (BBG) proposals to cut Voice of America (VOA) services, the independent, nongovernmental Committee for U.S. International Broadcasting reported today on its website www.cusib.org. Mrs. Lantos’s April 4, 2012 letter to the BBG begins: “I write in support of Voice of…
History, International Broadcasting, Public Diplomacy
Moral principles need to guide U.S. international broadcasting
by Ted Lipien I strongly urge the Broadcasting Board of Governors to reverse cuts to Voice of America Tibetan, Cantonese, Vietnamese, Burmese, and Lao broadcasting services. These VOA services offer uncensored news and hope to nations ruled by communist and authoritarian regimes. It’s the least the United States can do for these oppressed nations. People who are denied freedom need…
International Broadcasting
BBG Ready to Drop the Ax on Cantonese and Tibetan Services by CUSIB’s Ann Noonan in National Review
This article by the Committee for U.S. international Broadcasting (CUSIB) Executive Director Ann Noonan was published in National Review. We republish it from CUSIB’s website. BBG Ready to Drop the Ax on Cantonese and Tibetan Services By Ann Noonan March 5, 2012 In December 2011, the Broadcasting Board of Governors issued a proclamation in observance of Voice of America’s 70th anniversary…
This report is republished from Free Media Online and BBG Watch. In a Digital Journal news commentary, Op-Ed: America’s radios dancing to Putin’s tune in Moscow, former Voice of America acting associate director and journalist Ted Lipien revealed that Voice of America and Radio Liberty, funded by US taxpayers to promote media freedom abroad, self-censor news on two stations in…
“More than 30 years have passed since Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn wrote about the “Soft Voice of America” in an article that first appeared in National Review on April 30, 1982. Incredibly, today we appear again to be headed in the direction bemoaned by Solzhenitsyn all those years ago. While the budget for international broadcasting has certainly grown since Cold War days,…
International Broadcasting, Newspaper Articles
U.S. taxpayers funding pro-Putin VOA programs – Ted Lipien in Washington Examiner
Ted Lipien, a former Voice of America (VOA) acting associate director, has been warning for some time that marketing and staffing policies pushed by the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) executives have changed the focus of VOA and other BBG broadcasters from serious, accurate and well balanced journalism to ratings-chasing entertainment and sloppy reporting produced by inexperienced, poorly paid, otherwise…
International Broadcasting, Public Diplomacy, Russia
Russian Accuses Voice Of America Of Fake Interview – NPR
NPR’s Michele Kelemen, a former employee of Voice of America, reported on the recent VOA Russian Service interview with a leading Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny which he later described as “100 percent fake” and complained that VOA “went nuts.” The fake interview may have been created by Kremlin supporters who have been known to hijack email accounts of anti-Putin…
International Broadcasting, Newspaper Articles, Russia
Washington Times Op-Ed warns about pro-Putin bias in Voice of America Russian programs
In a Washington Times Op-Ed, a Committee for U.S. International Broadcasting member Ted Lipien warned about a pro-Putin bias in the Voice of America Russian programs. Lipien reported that a highly respected independent journalist in Russia hired by the Broadcasting Board of Governors to evaluate the VOA Russian website concluded last year that it has a pro-Kremlin bias and downplays…
International Broadcasting, Russia
Media freedom activist Ted Lipien warns against diminished public stake in U.S. international broadcasting
Republished from the Committee for U.S. International Broadcasting (CUSIB) website: In an article published in American Diplomacy, a quarterly electronic journal of commentary, analysis, and research on American foreign policy and its practice, the Committee for U.S. International Broadcasting (CUSIB) director Ted Lipien warns against diminished public stake in U.S. international broadcasting. Lipien, a former acting associate director of the…
Photos, Public Diplomacy
CUSIB members honor victims of human rights abuses in China, stress importance of VOA and RFA broadcasts
The Committee for U.S. International Broadcasting (CUSIB) members paid tribute to victims of human rights abuses in China by placing flowers Wednesday, December 7, in Washington, D.C. at the Victims of Communism Memorial. President of Women’s Rights Without Frontiers Reggie Littlejohn, president of the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) Local 1812 Timothy Shamble who represents the Broadcasting Board of…
This report was prompted by the news of the Voice of America Croatian Service being forced off the air and the Internet on the orders of the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) officials. VOA Croatian radio and TV broadcasts and online news content have served an important information and public diplomacy function, representing U.S. views, policies, interests, and concerns while…
International Broadcasting, Public Diplomacy
Newly-formed Committee for U.S. International Broadcasting vows to defend media freedom journalism
BBG Watch has learned that individuals associated with U.S. human rights, labor, and media freedom organizations have formed the Committee for U.S. International Broadcasting (CUSIB) with the aim of working with the Administration, Congress and media to promote free flow of uncensored news from the United States to countries in which journalists are threatened or lack sufficient resources. Many of…
Silencing VOA programming would end U.S. support for China’s freedom. John Lenczowski, who as President Reagan’s Soviet affairs adviser was instrumental in increasing funding for Voice of America and Radio Free Europe broadcasts to Poland during Solidarity’s struggle for democracy, wrote in a Washington Times op-ed that by proposing to end VOA radio and TV transmissions to China, the Broadcasting…
SENATOR CHARLES H. PERCY, 1919-2011 by Alan Heil Senator Percy passed away September 17 at the Washington Home in the District of Columbia after a long battle with Alzheimer’s disease. He was 91, just ten days shy of his 92nd birthday. The Illinois Senator and former Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee played a key role in enactment of…