Women: a new radio show from BBC News Afghan

29 June 2022

Women: a new radio show from BBC News Afghan

BBC News Afghanistan in Pashto and Dari has launched a weekly radio programme, Women (Mermen in Pashto, and Zan in Dari). The 30-minute show will go on air at 19:00 Kabul Time in Dari and at 20:00 in Pashto (14:30 and 15:30 GMT) every Friday.

Presented by Shazia Haya in Pashto and Aalia Farzan in Dari, the programme is aimed at women and girls – especially those in rural areas – in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Alongside offering them a platform to voice their views and questions, the new show will also deliver content that informs and educates, empowering the listeners to make informed decisions and choices.

The programme, which talks about women’s rights, healthcare, education, household economy, parenting, children’s health, as well as entertainment, sports and politics, opens with women-focused news from around the world. It discusses with experts the week’s main subject item and includes permanent slots on motherhood and childcare; inspiring stories about successful women from Afghanistan and around the world; and an arts & culture section dedicated to latest works by female writers, artists and musicians.

Shazia Haya and Aalia Farzan are BBC journalists who moved to the UK following the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan. Shazia says: “This programme for me means giving a voice to the voiceless. I hope Mermen will help empower the Afghan women to have better lives – and I feel really privileged to be part of such a journey.”

Aalia adds: “I want our new radio show, Zan, to serve as a window to every Afghan woman’s home. A window which opens every week to bring her the kind of knowledge that is really useful for her, and also to invite her to speak out about the things that worry or frustrate her.”

The new radio programme will be available via FM and shortwave frequencies across Afghanistan and will be available on demand via the websites bbc.com/pashto and bbc.com/persian/afghanistan, and the BBC News Pashto and BBC News Dari channels on Facebook.

BBC News Afghanistan service in Dari and Pashto is part of BBC World Service.

DW’s Limbourg: Diversity is one of strengths of DW’s Global Media Forum

24 June 2022

DW’s Limbourg: Diversity is one of strengths of DW’s Global Media Forum

Global Media Forum 2022 in Bonn concludes with the attendance of global media leaders: Maria Ressa, Leonid Volkov, Timothy Snyder, David Beasley, Paul Ronzheimer, Barkha Dutt, Audrey Tang, Ulrik Haagerup, Bernhard Pörksen and Gwen Lister.

The two-day Deutsche Welle (DW) media conference, titled “Shaping tomorrow now,” covered hybrid topics on-site in Bonn and online, including journalism education, climate change, digital activism, and war and pandemic reporting.

In his closing remarks, DW Director General Peter Limbourg emphasised the strength of DW’s Global Media Forum in bringing even people from countries in conflict with each other into conversation and constructive debate. “The diversity, reflected in the presence of journalists from Russia, Ukraine, Israel and the Palestinian Territories, was the strength of DW’s Global Media Forum,” he said. “We can ask critical questions. We can address everything. I’m really happy that we had these two days in Bonn.”

A highlight of the event was the keynote of Philippine journalist and Nobel Prize laureate Maria Ressa. “If you don’t have facts, you don’t have truth; if you don’t have truth, you don’t have trust,” Ressa said in her keynote. Fact-based journalism, she said, can restore the trust that has been lost to illiberal governments. A second Nobel Prize laureate, David Beasley, executive director of the World Food Programme, also attended this year’s media conference.

Peter Limbourg similarly addressed the loss of media credibility: “We are confronted with a storm of disinformation, propaganda and censorship. When the free and independent voices work together, we can withstand this storm and make a difference.”

In an emotional ceremony Monday evening, DW honoured Ukrainian photojournalists Mstyslav Chernov and Evgeniy Maloletka with the Freedom of Speech Award in recognition of their courageous reporting of the Russian attacks on the Ukrainian city of Mariupol in February and March. Jodie Ginsberg, president of the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), delivered the laudatory speech. Ensaf Haidar, wife of Saudi blogger Raif Badawi who received the first Freedom of Speech Award in 2015 while in prison for ten years, read a welcoming speech.

Reporting from the frontlines and combating disinformation

BILD Deputy Editor-in-chief Paul Ronzheimer reported from Ukraine on his war experiences: “Many journalists died in this war and that’s something you can’t get out of your head,” he said. In another panel discussion, Taiwan’s Digital Minister Audrey Tang and Russian opposition politician Leonid Volkov debated the threat of online censorship and methods to combat disinformation. “It is no coincidence that Putin and the Kremlin shut down all independent media in Russia on the first day of the war,” Volkov said. “They know full well that the media is part of the war effort.”

In his closing speech “Media Coverage in Times of Crisis,” U.S. historian Timothy Snyder drew a parallel between the famine in Soviet Ukraine in 1932-33 and the current Russian war in Ukraine: “Stalin took a particular political decision to blame the Ukrainians,” he said. “As with Stalin, so with Putin. This is a political decision with perfectly predictable consequences.”

On Tuesday afternoon, the ARD.ZDF Media Academy honoured three female graduates with the “Women and Media Technology” award for their work in the field of audio-visual media production and distribution. The award winners (first to third place): Katharina Greiner, Janine Jensch and Wiebke Middelberg.

The participants of the conference in Bonn were able to experience live broadcasts of the DW programs “JaafarTalk” and “Arts.21.” In addition, the 15th GMF offered numerous online events covering topics such as Internet censorship, fact-checking and reporting on the Ukraine war.

The DW Global Media Forum is Germany’s only international conference for representatives of the media from all over the world. Together with its main partners, the German Federal Foreign Office, the State of North Rhine-Westphalia, the Foundation for International Dialogue of the Savings Bank in Bonn, the Federal ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development and the City of Bonn, DW offers media professionals a unique opportunity for interdisciplinary discussions with opinion-leaders from different fields around the pressing issues of our time.

NZ government boosts RNZ Pacific capabilities

27 May 2022

NZ government boosts RNZ Pacific capabilities

New Zealand’s government has announced an NZ$4.4 million capital grant for RNZ Pacific

The grant is to provide capital funding for a new shortwave transmitter for New Zealand’s international broadcasts to the Pacific. RNZ Chief Executive and Editor-in-Chief Paul Thompson has welcomed the budget investment in RNZ Pacific shortwave transmitters.

RNZ Pacific broadcasts into the wider Pacific on shortwave 24 hours a day, collaborating with 22 broadcasting partners across the region. Its current primary transmitter is nearing end of life, and its other transmitter has in effect already been retired (it is mothballed, for use in the event of the failure of the main transmitter).

“The value of the RNZ Pacific service can’t be underestimated. Our voice reaches all parts of the Pacific, at times with critical information such as cyclone warnings. During the Tonga eruption, when the undersea cable was cut, RNZ Pacific short wave was a lifeline source of information,” said Thompson.

This investment secures a productive future for our unique voice. The attraction of the shortwave service is its robustness, and the ability to have the signal travel great distances, and achieve good audiences,” he said.

RNZ Pacific broadcasts enhance the Government’s Pacific strategy as we share our history, culture, politics and demographics. The strategy is underpinned by the building of deeper, more mature partnerships with Pacific Island countries, and by supporting their independence and sustainable social and economic resilience.

Since the ABC ceased its shortwave broadcasting the only other shortwave broadcaster in the region is China Radio International. Thompson says RNZ can now start work on its infrastructure development with a new transmitter likely to take approximately 12 months to get in place, subject to further project planning.

The current primary transmitter is a 100kW DRM-capable shortwave transmitter, operating from the Rangitaiki transmitting station on New Zealand’s North Island (176 25’ 47.02” E 38 50’ 33.35” S). The transmitter, manufactured by Thomson Broadcast, was installed in 2005. The site is fed by a digital link from the Wellington headquarters of RNZ, 400km south of the transmitting site. The site has antennae manufactured by TCI. Read more at https://www.rnz.co.nz/international/technical.

BBC to drop and combine channels, focus on digital future

26 May 2022

BBC to drop and combine channels, focus on digital future

The BBC has set out the blueprint to build a digital-first public service media organisation.

In a speech to staff on Thursday 26 May 2022, Director-General Tim Davie said the BBC must reform to stay relevant and continue to provide great value for all.

This will include changes to content and services, efficiency savings and a drive to seek new commercial investment, as the BBC manages the demands of the licence fee settlement (every UK household owning a TV set and watching live broadcasts must hold a TV licence) and looks to the future.

The broadcaster will adapt to compete and succeed in a busy, global market, while staying faithful to the values that have underpinned it for a century.

It will change in step with the modern world, giving audiences the content they want and delivering it to them in the ways they want it.

The plan focuses on creating a modern, digital-led and streamlined organisation that drives the most value from the licence fee and delivers more for audiences.

This first phase represents £500m of annual savings and reinvestment to make the BBC digital-led.

As part of this, £200m will contribute to the £285m annual funding gap by 2027/28, created by the licence fee settlement earlier this year. The remaining funding gap will be covered in the final three years of this Charter period, which is consistent with previous savings programmes.

The BBC will also reinvest £300m to drive a digital-first approach, through changes to content and output and additional commercial income. This includes:

Shifting significant amounts of money into new programmes for iPlayer which will also attract extra third-party investment on screen
Shifting resources in local output towards digital, while keeping spend flat
Making savings in broadcast news, reinvesting that in video and digital news
Investing up to £50m a year in product development.

Overall, there will be up to 1,000 fewer people employed in the public-funded part of the BBC over the next few years.

Detailed plans and budgets will be set out as normal in future Annual Plans and Annual Reports and Accounts.

Director-General Tim Davie told staff: “When I took this job I said that we needed to fight for something important: public service content and services, freely available universally, for the good of all.

“This fight is intensifying, the stakes are high.”

Examples of future changes announced today include:

The creation of a single, 24-hour TV news channel serving UK and international audiences, called BBC News, offering greater amounts of shared content, but maintaining the ability to offer separate broadcasts depending on what’s happening at home and abroad;
Plans to stop broadcasting smaller linear channels, such as CBBC and BBC Four and Radio 4 Extra, after the next few years;
Ongoing work to strip out any unnecessary bureaucracy, reduce running costs and simplify ways of working to free up time;
Plans to stop scheduling separate content for Radio 4 Long Wave, consulting with partners, including the Maritime and Coastguard Agency, ahead of the closure of the Long Wave platform itself;
Shifting a number of World Service languages to be digital only;
An ambition to reach 75% of BBC viewers through iPlayer each week;
Reviewing commercial options for audio production;
New on-demand content and formats for news and current affairs;
Requesting Ofcom to remove regulatory restrictions on iPlayer to expand boxsets and archive content;
Bigger investment in programming from the nations and regions across the UK;
Investment in an enhanced news and current affairs offer for iPlayer and Sounds, with new video formats, simulcasts and podcasts;
Changes in local radio and regional news to ensure high-quality, distinctive BBC local journalism is available every day when and where audiences want it;
Plans to accelerate digital growth in audio and drive listeners to BBC Sounds, simplifying schedules and cancelling shows that do not deliver;
Further investment in data to ensure comprehensive, real-time data that supports growth of digital products and services.

Speaking to staff, Mr Davie said: “This is our moment to build a digital-first BBC. Something genuinely new, a Reithian organisation for the digital age, a positive force for the UK and the world.

“Independent, impartial, constantly innovating and serving all. A fresh, new, global digital media organisation which has never been seen before.

“Driven by the desire to make life and society better for our licence fee payers and customers in every corner of the UK and beyond. They want us to keep the BBC relevant and fight for something that in 2022 is more important than ever.

“To do that we need to evolve faster and embrace the huge shifts in the market around us.”

Work will start immediately, with further details to be announced in the coming months, including consultations with staff.

Mr Davie added: “I believe in a public service BBC for all, properly funded, relevant for everyone, universally available, and growing in the on-demand age. This plan sets us on that journey.”

Russia closes CBC bureau in Moscow

18 May 2022

Russia closes CBC bureau in Moscow

Russia cancelling visas of CBC journalists

The Russian Foreign Affairs Ministry has announced that it is to close the Moscow bureau of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC). It will also withdraw visas for CBC journalists. The move follows the banning of Russia’s international TV channels RT English and RT France in March from being distributed in Canada.

“With regret we continue to notice open attacks on the Russian media from the countries of the so-called collective West who call themselves civilised,” Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova said.

“A decision has been taken to make retaliatory, I underscore retaliatory, measures in relation to the actions of Canada: the closure of the Moscow bureau of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, including the annulation of the accreditations and visas of their journalists.”

In April, Russia imposed sanctions against Catherine Tait, President of CBC and Michael Melling, VP News at CTV News, preventing them – and a range of politicians and business people – from visiting Russia.

Photo: CBC correspondent Briar Stewart on the rooftop of CBC’s Moscow bureau on Oct. 5, 2021. (CBC)

UK launch for Current Time on Freeview

5 May 2022

UK launch for Current Time on Freeview

Current Time, a Russian-language 24/7 TV channel broadcasting from Prague, has launched on Freeview UK, channel 271, via the Channelbox platform.

Current Time is a Russian-language TV channel headquartered in Prague and produced by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) in cooperation with Voice of America. The channel was established as an alternative to Kremlin-controlled media and brings real news, robust debate, and fact-based, unbiased, balanced reporting on local, regional, and international issues to Russian-speaking audiences everywhere.

Current Time has been under attack from the Kremlin since the channel began. It was designated as a foreign agent in December 2017, less than one year after its formal launch.

Following the launch of the Ukraina24 news channel last month, Current Time will further bolster Channelbox’s extensive news lineup, which includes Euronews, France24 and many others.

Channelbox is a multi-channel platform available on Freeview channel 271 and accessible via TV sets connected to the aerial and the internet. Channelbox is also available via its mobile applications worldwide.

“Current Time is happy to welcome its new viewers in the United Kingdom. The partnership with Channelbox is particularly important now as Current Time continues to provide its Russian-speaking audiences worldwide with uncensored news and information about Russia’s war on Ukraine,” said Pavel Butorin, Director, Current Time.

“We are very excited to have Current Time on the platform and to expand its distribution in the UK and worldwide. It is more important than ever for Russian speakers to have access to independent media, which is not controlled by the Kremlin”, said Tanya Kronfli, Channelbox Head of content and business development.

About Current Time

Current Time is a 24/7 TV and digital network for Russian speakers, led by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty in cooperation with Voice of America. The Current Time network’s roots reach back to August 2014 and the debut of the currenttime.tvwebsite, soon followed by its YouTube and Facebook channels and, in October 2014, the launch of its first, 30-minute news program. This was followed in February 2017 by the launch of Current Time’s 24/7 TV channel. In addition to reporting uncensored news and debunking disinformation through its Smotri v Oba (“Footage vs. Footage”) program, Current Time is the largest provider of independent, Russian-language films to its audiences. A sampling of Current Time’s best content can be found on the channel’s English portal.

About Channelbox

A free-to-air multi-channel platform available on Freeview devices connected to the Internet. Channelbox is accessible via Freeview channel 271 and mobile applications.