BBG Insists Congress Approved Its Decision to Terminate Voice of America Radio to Russia, Georgia, Ukraine, and Other Countries
By Ted Lipien
Free Media Online
November 23, 2008
In a letter that takes exception to the scathing criticism from the Public Diplomacy Council, a Washington, D.C-based nonprofit NGO, the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), which manages U.S. government-funded international broadcasts, insists that Congress had approved BBG’s decision to terminate Voice of America (VOA) radio broadcasts to several countries, including Russia, Georgia, Ukraine, and India. On orders from the BBG, VOA radio programs to Russia had ceased on July 26, just 12 days before the Russian military attack on Georgia.
Many foreign policy experts, members of Congress, and press freedom NGOs saw the BBG’s decision as a major public diplomacy blunder. But the BBG continues to defend its actions and claims that it had a go ahead from Congress to end VOA radio programs. After the start of the summer war in the Caucasus, the BBG suspended its orders to stop radio broadcasts to Georgia but refused to resume VOA shortwave broadcasts in Russian.
The Public Diplomacy Council members who have criticized the BBG come from diplomacy, the armed forces, nonprofits and academia. The BBG has few if any defenders. FreeMediaOnline.org could not identify any member of Congress or a prominent public diplomacy expert who would express approval for the BBG’s decision to terminate VOA radio broadcasts to Russia.
In a reaction to widespread criticism, the BBG spokesperson Letitia King wrote to the Public Diplomacy Council that “it is false to claim that the BBG has acted in any way that contravenes Congress.” She also stated the BBG “received Congressional approval for all program changes that have been made, including language service reductions,” and she called on the PDC to correct its error.
Ms. King also took issue with the Public Diplomacy Council’s claim that “the Broadcasting Board of Governors has taken special aim at the Voice of America,” by abolishing the VOA Arabic Service and reducing its broadcasts in English to the Middle East and other regions. She argued that the BBG “has sought efficiencies throughout the organization in order to concentrate resources on language broadcasts.”
FreeMediaOnline.org reported that while planning to eliminate VOA radio broadcasts to Russia and Georgia, the BBG and its most recent chairman James K. Glassman, the current Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs, also planned to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to expand their public relations operations. Among other things, the BBG had made an unsuccessful attempt to hire Paula Zahn, formerly of CNN, as their high profile spokesperson. The funds that the BBG wanted to allocate to this project could have paid for continuing VOA radio broadcasts to a country like Georgia.
In a document titled “Reforming U.S. International Broadcasting for a New Era,” the Public Diplomacy Council makes a number of proposals to reform U.S. international broadcasting and blames the BBG for undermining the effectiveness of the Voice of America. The Council has urged the future Obama Administration to immediately restore all radio services reduced at the VOA in FY 08.
