Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty open new headquarters

Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty today officially opened its new highly secured headquarters in Prague. “Security was our number-one consideration,” Steven Simmons, a member of the Broadcasting Board of Governors, said at a ceremony.
The move was partly sparked by heightened Czech fears of terrorism following the attacks of 11 September, 2001. RFE/RL has in recent years reduced its activities in Central and Eastern Europe to focus on Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, the Caucasus, Central Asia, Afghanistan, Iran and Iraq. The radio station with more than 1,000 journalists and correspondents broadcasts in 28 languages and has developed a range of websites.
Estonian President Toomas Hendrik Ilves, who worked at RFE/RL for nine years during communism and the post-Soviet transition, praised the radio for its efforts “to ensure there is a free press where the free flow of ideas is restricted.”
RFE/RL, founded by the United States during the Cold War in the 1950s, moved to Prague from Munich, Germany in 1995, settling down in the former Czechoslovak parliament building at the top of the central Wenceslas Square. After 9/11, Czech authorities decided to move the radio station out of the centre to a brand new headquarters that the station itself describes as one of the best-protected buildings in Europe.
(Source: AFP/R Netherlands Media Network Weblog)

Related story at:
http://blogs.rnw.nl/medianetwork/first-broadcast-from-new-rferl-headquarters

Radio Liberty broadcasts partially resume in Kygyzstan

Text of report by privately-owned Kyrgyz AKIpress news agency website
Bishkek, 17 December: Radio Azattyk (Liberty) resumed its broadcast on the territory of Kyrgyzstan on the short wave on 16 December.
Azattyk programmes are aired by means of HotBird and AsiaSat satellites as well as with the help of local partners - private radio companies Almaz, Salam, Most, Parlament and L-W. However, a short waveband does not cover all the territory of Kyrgyzstan as it used to be when broadcast was on the technical base of the Kyrgyz National Television and Radio Broadcasting Corporation [NTRBC]. Radio Azattyk now can air only in Kyrgyzstan’s north, and the south is not covered.
Azattyk is pessimistic about the prospects for resuming cooperation with the NTRBC.
(Source: AKIpress news agency website, Bishkek, in Russian 0415 gmt 17 Dec 08 via BBC Monitoring)
(R Netherlands Media Network Weblog)

Kyrgyz national broadcaster suspends Radio Liberty programs

Text of report by privately-owned Kyrgyz AKIpress news agency website
Bishkek, 2 December: The Kyrgyz National Television and Radio Broadcasting corporation [NTRC; main state-owned television and radio broadcaster] has stopped allocating radio waves to Radio Azattyk [Radio Liberty Kyrgyz Service] and Azattyk television programmes have ceased to exist on the channel [of the national television].
The state television and radio broadcaster stopped allocating the waves to the radio immediately after local elections [in October 2008].
Earlier, the NTRC director-general, Melis Eshimkanov, said that the denial of rebroadcasting was connected with non-performance of contractual financial commitments by Azattyk. On its part, the radio said at that time that it had paid off the debt to the NTRC in full.
Radio Azattyk programmes are currently being rebroadcast to Bishkek and [northern] Chuy Region by Radio Almaz and to [southern] Batken [Region] by Radio Salam [privately owned radio broadcasters]. Local radio stations in Karakol [town in northern Issyk-Kul Region] are deciding the question of rebroadcasting Radio Azattyk [to the region]. In the meantime, [southern] Osh and Dzhalal-Abad regions have no opportunities to rebroadcast Radio Azattyk programmes at the moment.
Radio Azattyk has refrained from making any comments on this to the AKIpress news agency.
Top officials of the international network of Radio Liberty/Radio Free Europe from Prague are expected to arrive this week to settle this issue.
(Source: AKIpress news agency website, Bishkek, in Russian 1156 gmt 2 Dec 08 via BBC Monitoring/R Netherlands Media Network Weblog)