6 September 2019
The Chairman of the Board of the US Agency for Global Media (USAGM) issued the following statement:
After four years serving as the first Chief Executive Officer (CEO) and Director of the U.S. Agency for Global Media (USAGM), John F. Lansing will be leaving USAGM–an independent federal agency providing accurate, objective, and professional news and information worldwide–at the end of this month to start the next chapter of his career as the President and CEO of National Public Radio (NPR).
John joined USAGM at a pivotal time in the history of U.S. international media. He provided the vision and collaborative spirit needed to drive growth and innovation during some of the most trying times for global press freedom. The Board is very grateful for, and deeply impressed by, the results achieved during his tenure, including:
- USAGM’s dramatic audience increase to 345 million people weekly and the high level of trust they have in USAGM’s programming;
- Shift to a digital-first content creation and enhancements to the agency’s internet freedom efforts, resulting in notable online audience growth;
- Advancement of a global language-based content strategy, rather than a country-based strategy, to reach key audiences and diaspora communities in Russian with Current Time, Persian with VOA 365, and in the coming months, Mandarin;
- Establishment of the International Coordinating Committee (ICC), made up of USAGM’s five network heads and the CEO, to break apart silos and work collaboratively as force multiplier; and
- Honoring brave journalists by dedicating a memorial wall to the fallen and launching the USAGM Employee Association to support slain and injured journalists and their families.
John has put USAGM on solid footing to advance our mission to inform, engage, and connect people around the world in support of freedom and democracy. Our networks’ game-changing news and information programming, shared across one of the widest media distribution portfolios in the world, resonates with policy makers, stakeholders, other media outlets, and most important, our audience.
It is the Board’s top priority to find the best individual to run USAGM upon John’s departure, and we will update you on next steps. In the meantime, I would like to say how much I have enjoyed working with John and how I value his vision, commitment, and enthusiasm. I know that my colleagues on the Board and across USAGM share that sentiment. We offer heartfelt thanks to John for his transformative leadership and wish him all the best.
(Source: USAGM press release)
5 September 2019
Helping Hands – the Lives of Atomic Bomb Orphans (September 21)
Some 6,500 children are believed to have lost their parents when the United States dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima in 1945, Many wandered the streets. Some died of hunger and disease, but others were able to survive thanks to helping hands. A number of Americans backed a movement to support the orphans. In South Korea, poor people helped a parentless child with love, as if they were all family. The programme shows the good will that war could not destroy.
OTHER HIGHLIGHTS:
Future Princes of Ballet (Part I September 20; Part II September 21)
A teenage boy of Japanese descent is working to make his mark at one of the world’s top ballet schools. Aaron Osawa-Horowitz is studying with legendary dancer Nikolay Tsiskaridze, the rector of the Vaganova Academy of Russian Ballet. Tsiskaridze is known for his strictness, and Osawa-Horowitz hope to rise to the challenge. Tune in to see how he and his classmates cooperate and compete at the graduation performance at Mariinsky Theatre.
(Source: NHK World TV)
4 September 2019
The TRT World Forum 2019 will be taking place on October 21st and 22nd in Istanbul. The theme of this year’s Forum is “Globalisation in Retreat: Risks and Opportunities”.
TRT World Forum will bring together politicians, policy makers, academics, journalists, and leading experts. The forum will highlight the most pressing global issues of our time.
Among the participants of this year’s Forum, which will include international opinion leaders as well as distinguished figures in global politics are María Fernanda Espinosa Garcés, President of the United Nations Parliament Assembly for the 73rd session, Dilma Vana Rousseff, former President of Brazil, Anwar Ibrahim, The People’s Justice Party Leader in Malaysia, Yanis Varoufakis, the main opposition leader in Greece, George Ciamba, , Romanian Delegate-Minister for European affairs, Christian Kern, former Chancellor of Austria, Esko Aho, former Finnish Prime Minister and Riyad Farid Hijab, former Syrian Prime Minister.
İbrahim Eren: “TRT World Forum has become a global brand”
İbrahim Eren, Director General and Chairman of TRT, stated that “TRT World Forum has become a world brand since its launch in 2017”. Eren added “In addition to being a public broadcasting media, TRT is also a platform in search of solutions to global problems. The Forum has become an ambitious brand in the third year and will continue to pursue success in the same way.”
The Forum attracts global thinkers
TRT World Forum is seeking solutions to current cultural, political, economic and social problems. It will build on its success over the last two years in hosting eye-opening conversations with world leaders, activists, leading experts and opinion leaders.
The Forum, which will take place under the theme of “Globalisation in Retreat: Risks and Opportunities” will hold over 30 sessions over two days to discuss the issues that occupy the world agenda. Issues to be addressed include political, economic and social issues that concern the entire world, such as far-right terrorism, the rise of populism and nationalism, the future of the Middle East, trade wars, future of the European Union and the cooperation of emerging powers.
(Source: TRT press release)
3 September 2019
The ancient “Katta Langar” Qur’an, named after the Uzbek village – its centuries-long home – is the subject of a 40-minute documentary now live on the website bbc.com/uzbek and the BBC News Uzbek YouTube channel. In Katta Langar Qur’oni izidan (In search of Katta Langar Qur’an) BBC News Uzbek teams up with Uzbekistan’s popular TV channel, Sevimli TV, to trace the twists and turns in the life of the unique manuscript.
The documentary editor, BBC News Uzbek’s Diloram Ibrahimova, says: “Telling the story of the rare 8th century Qur’an demanded great sensitivity and a very careful approach. Our film is a culmination of months-long collaboration between BBC News Uzbek and Sevimli TV and showcases the expertise and creativity of the BBC teams in London and Sevimli TV film crew in Tashkent.”
The idea of the joint project came from the Head of Sevimli TV, Firdavs Abdukhalikov, following the signing of a memorandum of understanding on editorial collaboration with BBC News Uzbek. He supported the project from the start. Throughout the month of Ramadan, as the documentary was being filmed, Sevimli TV featured daily primetime series in which the fascinating discoveries made by the joint team were shared with the channel’s viewers. Firdavs Abdukhalikov says: “Our joint project is a great contribution to the research into the ‘Katta Langar’ Qur’an. I am really happy that Sevimli TV viewers can now watch the BBC News Uzbek film about this manuscript that is unique in the Muslim world.”
Joint BBC and Sevimli TV team travelled to the remote mountainous village of Katta Langar in Uzbekistan, home to the manuscript considered to be one of the very first written versions of the Qur’an. The documentary presenter and producer, Luiza Iskandariy, says: “It was fascinating to learn how this little village harboured its great treasure. Throughout our journey every new discovery kept adding new questions and intricacies to our story, also reflecting the history of the region.”
The film probes various explanations of how the “Katta Langar” Qur’an appeared in Central Asia and how its pages ended up in different countries. Luiza speaks with the villagers whose ancestors and relatives trace their proud guardianship from the 15th century. The cherished manuscript, which survived a journey from Arabia via Iran and Afghanistan to Central Asia, was seized many times – by the colonising tsarist Russian army, by the KGB in the Soviet times, and finally, for safekeeping by newly independent state of Uzbekistan. The investigation also takes the joint crew to an Uzbek village whose residents claim their ancestry from the Arabian Peninsula and still display elements of the Arab culture.
The documentary establishes that the bulk of the missing pages – a total of 81 – are kept in the St Petersburg Institute of Oriental Manuscripts. Twelve pages are in treasury of the Spiritual Directorate of the Muslims of Uzbekistan in Tashkent while random pages are in other locations in Tashkent, and in a museum and a library in Bukhara. An estimated hundred pages of the “Katta Langar” Qur’an are still unaccounted for.
Now live on the BBC News Uzbek website, Katta Langar Qur’oni izidan will air on Sevimli TV this week. It also will be broadcast on BBC News Uzbek TV partner station in Afghanistan, Arezo TV.
BBC News Uzbek, which has a weekly reach of 2.3m across platforms, offers content tailored for Uzbek-speakers in Uzbekistan as well as Afghanistan and the rest of the world, and is one of the largest international news providers in the region. In addition to the website bbc.com/uzbek, BBC News Uzbek connects with audiences via Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, Twitter and Odnoklassniki as well as Telegram. The BBC’s 10-minute TV news bulletin for Uzbek-speakers in Afghanistan has a weekly audience of 1.8 million.
BBC News Uzbek is part of BBC World Service.
(Source: BBC press release)
28 August 2019
As Reporters Without Borders (RSF) reports on its website, two more murders in August have brought the number of journalists killed in connection with their work in Mexico in 2019 to at least ten, confirming Mexico’s status as the world’s deadliest country for the media. In the absence of a strong reaction from the government, RSF offers its recommendations on how to address this extreme level of violence and the almost total impunity.
More than 90% of the crimes of violence against journalists in Mexico go unpunished, fuelling the vicious cycle of violence and impunity. It was for this reason that, in March 2019, RSF asked the International Criminal Court to look into the impunity for murders and disappearances of journalists from 2006 to 2018, under President López Obrador’s two predecessors, Felipe Calderón and Enrique Peña Nieto.
In response to the surge in the number of journalists murdered in 2019, RSF has provided the Mexican authorities, including the president’s office, with its recommendations on the measures that need to be taken.
RSF recommends that the Mexican authorities should:
1) Reinforce journalists’ safety:
– By improving the effectiveness and response time of the Federal Mechanism for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders and Journalists, increasing its human and financial resources and enhancing its role in preventing risks, especially in the most dangerous states.
– By rapidly implementing the recommendations of the “Diagnosis of the Functioning of the Mechanism”, that the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights gave to the Mexican authorities on 29 July and made public on August 26.
– By implementing a general policy for taking care of journalists and family members who are the victims of forced displacement.
2) Reinforce investigative resources
Given that the Special Prosecutor’s Office for Crimes against Freedom of Expression (FEADLE) will soon be incorporated into a new Special Prosecutor’s Office for Human Rights, there is an urgent need to:
– Reinforce the FEADLE’s prerogatives and its human and financial resources.
– Quickly release the new guidelines for FEADLE investigations into crimes of violence against journalists and explain how the FEADLE’s decisions can be appealed.
– Encourage the FEADLE to make full use of its power under article 21 of the criminal code to transfer investigations into crimes against freedom of expression from the local to the federal level. RSF is of the view that this power should be used without delay in three of this year’s murder cases, those of Ruíz, Sarabia and Romero.
– Ensure that the new Approved Protocol for Investigating Crimes against Freedom of Expression, adopted in October 2018, is effectively applied.
– Ensure that the new Special Prosecutor’s Office for Human Rights – of which the FEADLE will be a section – quickly establishes close contacts with civil society organizations in order to discuss the new goals and challenges.
Mexico is ranked 144th out of 180 countries in RSF’s 2019 World Press Freedom Index.
(Source: RSF)
15 August 2019
BBC World Service has extended output on shortwave radio in Indian-administered Kashmir to provide reliable news and information.
Director of the BBC World Service, Jamie Angus (pictured), said: “The provision of independent and trusted news in places of conflict and tension is one of the core purposes of the World Service. Given the shutdown of digital services and phone lines in the region, it’s right for us to try and increase the provision of news on our short wave radio services. Audiences in both India and Pakistan trust the BBC to speak with an independent voice, and we know that our reporting through several moments of crisis this year has been popular and valued by audiences who turn to us when tensions are highest.”
BBC News Hindi radio output (9515 and 11995kHz) will be extended by 30 minutes from Friday 16 August. The full one hour news programme will be on air from 19:30 to 20:30 local time.
On Monday 19 August, BBC News Urdu will launch a 15-minute daily programme, Neemroz. Broadcast at 12.30 local time on 15310kHz and 13650kHz, the programme will focus on news coming from Kashmir and the developments around the issue, and include global news roundup tailored for audiences in Kashmir.
BBC World Service English broadcasts (11795kHz, 9670kHz, 9580kHz, 7345kHz, 6040kHz) will be expanded, with the morning programming extended by an hour, ending at 08.30 local time; and the afternoon and evening programming starting an hour earlier, at 16.30 local time.
The shutdown has left people with very few options for accessing news at this time. However, news services from the BBC continue to be available in the region – through shortwave radio transmissions in English, Urdu, Hindi, Dari and Pashto. As well as providing an important source of news to the region, the South Asian language services have brought added depth to the BBC’s coverage of the Kashmir story.
The recent introduction of four new languages services for India – Gujarati, Marathi, Punjabi and Telugu, following additional investment from the UK Government – has enabled the BBC to offer a wider portfolio of languages and distribution methods to a region that is geographically diverse as well as politically tense. This year’s Global Audience Measure for the BBC showed that India is now the World Service’s largest market, with a weekly audience of 50m.
