(Washington, DC) - U.S. Rep. Gary Ackerman (D-NY), Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on the Middle East and South Asia, today made the following opening statement during the Subcommittee’s hearing entitled “Public Diplomacy in the Middle East and South Asia: Is the Message Getting Through?” The hearing focused critical oversight on the lack of a coherent strategy and necessary structure to implement U.S. public diplomacy objectives in two of the most vital regions of the world. The hearing also examined the recent controversy surrounding broadcasts on al-Hurra, the U.S. government’s Arabic-language satellite television channel.

"The subcommittee will come to order.  At the end of the Cold War there was a great desire to review and re-organize the foreign policy structures of the Untied States to better address the challenges of a world where communism had been defeated.  One of the casualties of this reorganization was the United States Information Agency, which up until 1999, was focused on promoting America’s interests, culture and policies in a variety of ways to diverse global audiences.  After the collapse of the Soviet Union, public diplomacy was regarded as less important, after all the communists were gone, so why did we need to explain ourselves?  The September 11 attacks made it painfully clear who we should be explaining ourselves to and made it equally clear that public diplomacy should always have been a priority of U.S. foreign policy.

Since USIA was abolished, there have been more than 30 separate reports and articles concerning public diplomacy from which the Department of State has claimed it drew valuable suggestions.  The 9/11 Commission, the Council on Foreign Relations, the Rand Corporation, the United States Institute for Peace, the Public Diplomacy Council, the Government Accountability Office even the State and Defense Departments have all issued reports and calls for action regarding the urgency of effective public diplomacy.  Many of these reports called for identifying what America stands for and communicating that clearly. 
10 of the reports recommended defining an overall strategy.  Others called for reorganizing the public diplomacy function, again.  But what is most distressing is that 8 years after USIA was abolished and 5 and ½ years after the September 11 attacks, GAO testified last month that “the government lacked an interagency communications strategy.”  Like so many other foreign policy endeavors of this Administration, there is no plan.

Last year, the President established a new Policy Coordination Committee on Public Diplomacy and Strategic Communications.  Among the things this new committee is doing is developing a pilot program in 18 countries where our overseas posts will examine the local media environment and identify target audiences to help develop a strategy to counter extremism.  Sounds good, but USIA used to do precisely this and more.  USIA developed a comprehensive communications strategy in each country around the world.  So in addition to not having a strategy, the Administration has decided to re-invent the wheel before coming up with one.  This would be funny, if the mission weren’t so important.

No discussion of public diplomacy would be complete without some mention of broadcasting.  To be sure, Radio Sawa, al-Hurra, Radio Farda and VOA’s Persian and Urdu language television play crucial roles in providing news and information to audiences in ways they would not otherwise see or hear it.  While I don’t doubt that broadcasting adds value, I like others, have a hard time quantifying that value. 
Simply measuring audience size is great but it doesn’t tell us much about how or whether our broadcasting influences those who receive it.  I have heard, anecdotally, that Radio Sawa is very popular among its target audience in the Arab world, but I’ve also heard that those who listen turn it off when the news comes on because they know its an American broadcast.  If that’s true, how does it help us?

These are questions of audience sampling and with the right measurements are ultimately knowable.  More troubling is the actual content of some recent broadcasting on al-Hurra.  Press reports have detailed instances where Hasan Nasrallah was broadcast live giving a speech inciting a crowd to violence against Israel, in clear violation of the network’s guidelines prohibiting terrorists from using their programs as a platform.  Similarly, al-Hurra broadcast Palestinian Authority Prime Minister and Hamas leader Ismail Haniya discussing the Mecca Accord and most distressingly carried sympathetic coverage of the Holocaust denier’s conference in Tehran.

The last incident is particularly offensive.  There is absolutely no doubt that the Holocaust occurred.  None.  And to provide news coverage in such a way as to legitimize those who suggest that it didn’t is simply outrageous.  Why are American taxpayer dollars used to spread the hate, lies and propaganda of these nuts, when our goal was to counter them? 
The Broadcasting Board of Governors has provided explanations for both the Nasrallah speech and the Haniya coverage.  The coverage of Haniya, one of the parties to the Mecca Accord I understand, I don’t like it, but I understand it.  The explanation for the Nasrallah speech however just doesn’t stand up.  Was it really a miscommunication?  He spoke for more than 30 minutes, live, on our network, inciting violence against Israel.  Doesn’t anybody watch the broadcasts as they’re occurring to ensure that what’s supposed to be broadcast, actually is?  Notwithstanding the BBG’s explanations, I can only conclude based on the trend of the last few months that al-Hurra’s news executives have decided that pandering is the way to greater audience share.  I’m sure many members agree with me that if this is the new direction of al-Hurra, it’s the wrong direction and the American taxpayers certainly shouldn’t be made to pay for it if it continues.

I would now like to recognize my distinguished friend from Indiana, the Ranking Member, Mr. Pence."

Witnesses included several officials from the U.S. Department of State including: Jeremy Curtin, Coordinator of the Bureau of International Information Programs; Gretchen Welch, Director of the Office of Policy, Planning, and Resources; Thomas A. Farrell, Deputy Assistant Secretary for Academic Programs for Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs and Alina L. Romanowski, Deputy Assistant Secretary for Professional and Cultural Exchanges for the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs.

Additional witnesses included Joaquin F. Blaya and D. Jeffrey Hirschberg, both Board Members of the Broadcasting Board of Governors.

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