Are Farsi-language broadcasts helping?

Washington Times

TODAY’S EDITORIAL
March 9, 2007

Today, as Washington grapples with the threats posed by Iranian support for terrorism and efforts to develop nuclear weapons, it appears that American policy-makers are being forced to choose between very bad options: 1) taking military action against Iranian nuclear sites and other regime targets, or 2) continuing to push for passage of largely unenforceable U.N. resolutions and hoping that if the regime develops nuclear weapons, we would somehow be able to use some form of “containment” to deal with the problem.

We find ourselves in this untenable position today due in part to our neglect of alternatives such as the development of radio stations oriented towards taking the American message directly to the Iranian people. In his position as ranking member on the Senate Homeland Security Subcommittee on Government Information, Sen. Tom Coburn, Oklahoma Republican, has made it his mission to reform what he views as a largely dysfunctional system of broadcasting to Iran. In a letter to President Bush last month, Mr. Coburn made a powerful case that Radio Farda, which broadcasts music and other entertainment programs to Iran, and the Voice of America’s Farsi-language service “may actually be harming American interests rather than helping.”

As chairman of the subcommittee last year, Mr. Coburn held a hearing on the Iranian nuclear question, in which lawmakers heard testimony from Amirabbas Fakhravar, an Iranian dissident who wants the United States to publicly support regime change in his country. Imprisoned in 2002 after writing a book denouncing Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, he managed to escape Iran three years later. Mr. Fakhravar told the subcommittee in July that Radio Farda and VOA “are presently giving more assistance to the regime than to the dissident movement” in Iran by touting fraudulent efforts to institute reforms within the Islamist regime. Subsequent complaints from native Farsi speakers who monitor U.S. broadcasts to Iran and a report commissioned by the State Department and National Security Council mirrored Mr. Fakhravar’s testimony. The federal Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) disputes the criticisms and periodically provides examples of broadcasts it describes as balanced. But according to Mr. Coburn, the board has not conducted a systematic review of all content broadcast into Iran and is limited in its ability to oversee broadcasting content because there are no English-language transcripts of U.S. international broadcasting. Along with his letter to the president, Mr. Coburn attached several transcripts of VOA’s Farsi-language coverage of the State of the Union address. One of the two guests provided by VOA, Dr. Mansour Farhang, “uses a Farsi term best described as ‘baseless statement’ to describe your State of the Union speech,” Mr. Coburn wrote. “Dr. Farhang’s hostility is further expressed when he describes your Iraq policy as having ‘no connection to reality.’ ” Dr. Farhang then went on to blame the United States for increased violence and instability in Iraq. The only other guest, who was supposed to balance the criticism, said he agreed with this harsh assessment of U.S. policy.

All of this is particularly tragic in view of the fact that the Iranian government would appear to be quite vulnerable to the kinds of pressures that U.S. radio broadcasts, properly done, could help generate. Public-opinion polls taken in recent years suggest that an overwhelming majority of Iranians admire the United States and/or want to bring down the Islamist regime in Tehran, and despite a brutal secret-police, visitors to the country frequently say they have little trouble finding Iranians who want to be rid of clerical rule. Iran has been convulsed by unrest and violence, particularly in the southeastern Baluchistan region, where last month Sunni radicals killed 11 members of the elite Revolutionary Guards in a bus bombing. On Feb. 19, one week after the bombing, the regime televised the hanging of a man it said was responsible for the attack. It would be a positive thing if BBG were offering Iranians a real alternative — something better than the likes of both Dr. Farhang and public hangings.

But, that does not appear to be happening today. As Mr. Coburn wrote in his letter to the president: “Our international broadcasting needs serious management and accountability reforms. Given the international challenges and threats to our national security, I believe it is vital that this important public diplomacy does not undermine your role as our lead diplomat. The status quo should not continue.”

And if BBG thinks it is getting a bum rap from Mr. Coburn, it would do well to conduct its own comprehensive study of its Farsi-language broadcasts and set the record straight.

German plot suspect’s laptop stored recipe for bomb

By Agence France Presse (AFP).

BERLIN: Bomb-building instructions have been found on the deleted hard drive of a computer belonging to one of the suspects in the attempted bombing last summer of two trains in Germany, a newspaper reported on Wednesday.

Investigators believe two of the Lebanese men arrested on suspicion of planting the bombs had used the instructions to build the devices, which failed to explode on two suburban trains on July 31 last year, the Sueddeutsche Zeitung said in an advance extract of its Thursday edition.

German police experts managed to retrieve the data from a deleted hard drive on a laptop which one of the suspects, Jihad Hamad, had taken with him on his return trip from Germany to Lebanon.

Hamad is due to go on trial with four other men in Lebanon on April 11, Lebanese authorities said this week.

The other main suspect in the case, Youssef Mohammed al-Hajj Dib, remains in custody in Germany.

German federal police said the publication of cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed in Western and some Arab media had been the catalyst for the bombing plot.

Investigators believe faulty detonators prevented the bombs from exploding.

Hamad had confessed earlier this week under judicial interrogation to planting one of the bombs, a Lebanese judicial source said. He had told Investigating Magistrate Michel Abou Arraj that he was trying to avenge the publication of cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad, judicial reports added.

On Monday, police took the four suspects under heavy security from Roumieh prison to the Justice Palace in Beirut, where they underwent preliminary interrogation. – With AFP.

Historical issues stall Japan-North Korea talks

Source: CNN.

HANOI, Vietnam (Reuters) — Japan and North Korea cut short talks on Thursday about establishing diplomatic ties after wrangling again over historical differences, officials said.

Japan said the two sides would “continue to exchange views” but no date was scheduled for more talks, part of a six-country deal last month to halt impoverished Pyongyang’s nuclear weapons program in exchange for aid and diplomatic recognition.

Japan says forming ties is impossible without resolution of the issue of Japanese abducted by the reclusive communist state in the 1970s and 1980s. Meanwhile, North Korea is pressing for settlement of issues stemming from Japan’s harsh 1910-45 colonial rule over the Korean peninsula.

North Korea’s chief negotiator Song Il-ho told reporters after Thursday’s session at the North Korean embassy in Hanoi that the abduction issue “has been completely resolved by our sincere efforts”.

He urged Japan to settle the past, lift sanctions and stop “suppressing” North Koreans living in Japan.

North Korea admitted in 2002 that its agents had abducted 13 Japanese to train Pyongyang spies in Japanese culture and language, sparking outrage in Japan.

Five people were repatriated. Japan has demanded the return of any survivors, but Pyongyang says the other eight are dead and cannot be sent back.

In a briefing, Song described Japan’s position as “an unreasonable insistence.” But Japan’s delegation head, Koichi Haraguchi said, “It is deplorable that North Korea did not respond sincerely to the abduction issue.”

The original schedule had called for two full days of talks in communist-run Vietnam, which has good relations with both Japan and North Korea.

Delegates met on Wednesday morning at the Japanese embassy, but then cancelled an afternoon session at the North Korean embassy. Thursday’s meeting lasted less than an hour.

As part of the deal struck in Beijing, North Korea this week sent its chief nuclear envoy to the United States for talks and a delegation to meet the Japanese. By contrast, the talks in New York were “very good” according to an American envoy.

The Japan-North Korea talks were the first since they met in Beijing more than a year ago. Those made no visible progress, either.

In Tokyo, Kyodo news agency reported on Thursday that Prime Minister Shinzo Abe might order a new study of the government’s role in forcing women, many of them Koreans, to act as sex slaves for Japanese soldiers during World War Two.

Abe has angered the Koreans and other Asians with remarks that appeared to question the state’s role, although he has also said a 1993 apology acknowledging coercion remained in effect. (Full story)

Separately on Wednesday at the United Nations, North Korea’s envoy accused Japan of creating “a horrific atmosphere of terror” for pro-Pyongyang groups in Japan with investigations into their activities following Pyongyang’s 2006 nuclear and missile tests.

Western, Asian and developing nations on the board of the Vienna-based U.N. International Atomic Energy Agency watchdog on Wednesday urged North Korea to honor the deal toward de-nuclearization of the divided Korean Peninsula.

The six-party agreement included North and South Korea, which are still technically at war after the truce that ended the 1950-53 Korean war. The others are the United States, China, Japan and Russia.