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Tuesday, March 11, 2008

Democratic Voice of Burma under fire


As the exiled Democratic Voice of Burma matures into a seasoned news organization, serving audiences in Burma and abroad, some exiled politicians criticized its “independence” last week, calling for more advocacy views and opinions representing political opposition groups.
During a panel discussion on exiled media organized by the Democratic Voice of Burma in Bangkok last week, a lively debate emerged around DVB’s independent radio and television broadcast stations.
(Source: R Netherlands Media Network Weblog)

Related story link from The Irrawaddy:
http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=10784

DVB logging:
Germany (non), 5955, Democratic Voice of Burma, Tentative, 2320-0030, At tune in, noted instrumentals music until 2327 at which time the signal goes silent for 3 minutes to 2330. Between 2330 to 0059 noted a program of Oriental language news, commentary and features which featured male and
female commentators. On the hour, at 0001 comments continue until 0006 when music is presented. Signal has improved from at threshold level at 2320 to a good level at 0006. The only station I can find that comes close to this schedule on 5955 is the Democratic Voice of Burma, relayed from Germany. Of course that applies if we say the schedule began at 2330 after the silent period mentioned above; to do that we need to ignore the 7 minutes from 2320 to 2327 when I heard music on this frequency. At that time, Germany may have been relaying a different station on the same frequency? The word "Burmese" heard at 0015. Minutes later, a male in Language mentioned "Burma" during his comments. At 0026 after the above commentary from 0015 to 0026, music is presented. Music stops abruptly at 0029 and is followed by dead air. and at 0030 signal drops off the air. Signal was good at the end.
(Chuck Bolland, FL March 10, 2008)