BBG Watch
America’s top expert on Kremlin propaganda Paul Goble said that the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), the federal agency in charge of Voice of America (VOA), Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) and other U.S. taxpayer-funded media outlets serving overseas audiences, is making a mistake in planning to shut down RFE/RL shortwave radio broadcasts in Russian and in three North Caucasian languages, Avar, Chechen, and Circassian.
“At a time when Vladimir Putin is suppressing media freedom across his country and Russianizing the media space in the non-Russian portions of his country, the United States has taken two decisions about international broadcasting that send very much the wrong signals to the peoples of that land by not sending signals at all,” Paul Goble wrote in an article posted on his Window of Eurasia blog which offers nearly daily analysis of media and expert opinions from Russia and other former Soviet states.
RFE/RL’s North Caucasus Service is the only international broadcaster to provide objective news and analysis to the North Caucasus in Chechen, Circassian and Avar.
READ MORE: US Sending the Wrong Signals to Peoples of Russia by Not Sending Them at All, Paul Goble, Window on Eurasia, June 7, 2016
Paul A. Goble, a longtime specialist on ethnic and religious questions in Eurasia, served as special adviser on Soviet nationality issues and Baltic affairs to Secretary of State James Baker. He is the editor of four volumes on ethnic issues in the former Soviet Union and has published more than 150 articles on ethnic and nationality questions. He worked in various capacities in the U.S. State Department, the Central Intelligence Agency and the International Broadcasting Bureau as well as at the Voice of America and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. He lectures on Islam, Eurasia geopolitics, and propaganda.
ALSO SEE: Masters of bad timing: BBG to eliminate Radio Liberty’s shortwave broadcasts in Russian, Ted Lipien, BBG Watch, June 2, 2016
ALSO SEE: Optimistic BBG plans to eliminate RFE/RL Radio Liberty shortwave radio transmissions to Russia, Crimea, other Russian-speaking regions, BBG Watch, June 1, 2016