The Media Missionaries

8. ASIA (CONTINUED)

ASIA COUNTRY REPORTS

CENTRAL ASIA

AFGHANISTAN:

(See narrative, above.) Best-selling author and Wall Street Journal columnist Ahmed Rashid, working with Internews, also has contributed money personally for media assistance in the region. Although Television-Kabul is back on the air, it reaches only five miles outside of Kabul, using old Russian equipment and a "dish made of Coca-Cola cans." There remains a critical gap for local news, he said, as most people listen to the BBC's international broadcasts. Rashid warned Western donors that recovery could be "a messy ordeal, with two steps forward followed by two steps back." He said the U.S. should be actively engaged in the redevelopment and "sit on top" of the countries and agencies involved. (11) Also active in Afghanistan are USAID, the Institute for War and Peace Reporting, Baltic Media Center, funded by the Danish government, AINA, a French group headed by National Geographic photographer Reza (12), and Media Action International, which specializes in reporting on humanitarian crises and assistance

KAZAKHSTAN:

In spring 2002 as this report went to press, the repressive government was recalling many broadcasting licenses for alleged violations of the language and mass media laws. The best independent daily newspaper in Kazakhstan was closed by the government a few years ago. Internews is active here and has a knowledgeable local director, Oleg Katsiev. oleg@internews.kz

KYRGYZSTAN:

Internews has an active organization here, which provides legal support and training for embattled broadcasters. With a grant from the Eurasia Foundation, Internews provided a fulltime local lawyer to provide on-call legal aid to journalists. American University in Kyrgzstan was started with help from the University of Nebraska, which has since been replaced by Indiana University as the major partner. Soros OSI funds the university's library and computer/technology support. Faculty from Indiana, Ohio, Illinois and Kentucky come for semesters to teach a range of subjects, including media law and ethics. (13)

TAJIKISTAN:

Internews helped bring together Tajikistan's independent media to form the National Association of Independent Mass Media in Tajikistan in 1999. Same media repression profile as the other "stans."

TURKMENISTAN:

Similar to other "stans."

UZBEKISTAN:

The Ferghana Valley in Uzbekistan is the nexus of political, economic and ethnic problems in Central Asia. (14) It has long been out of the international spotlight, partly because it resists foreign intervention. The government is draconian in its repression of journalists. They recently detained and released under international pressure Ruslan Sharipov, president of the Union of Independent Journalists of Uzbekistan (UIJU) for writing about human rights violations. Typical is its current harassment of Yevgheniy Dyakonov, founder of the online magazine "Zone." The pressure has included intimidation by the Uzbek special security services, and physical attacks on family members. (15) Government censors work on the third floor of the building on Matbuotchilar St. where most of the Tashkent newspapers are published. The papers are forbidden to show any indication that stories have been altered by the censors. International news sections contain no information about Russia, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan, because they have uneasy relations with Uzbekistan. Nothing can be reported about border conditions and conflicts, alcoholism, drug addiction, natural disasters involving human casualties, agricultural problems, disease outbreaks or the discovery of new diseases, or criminal activity or investigations.(16) Internews is active here. So is the Open Society Institute Assistance Foundation-Uzbekistan (OSIAF).

SOUTH ASIA

INDIA:

CPJ reports that India's free press is "probably the strongest pillar of its democracy." It is notoriously full of tabloid gossip and rumor. The more serious story of the Kashmir crisis has, however, led to violent and legal attacks against local and foreign journalists. Tax inspectors raided the leading news magazine Outlook after it ran an expose of the prime minister's office. A commission was set up to investigate after a Web publisher, Tehelka.com, caught senior officials on camera taking bribes from journalists posing as arms dealers, but that commission "seemed more interested in investigating the news outlet's questionable reporting methods" than following up on the government's misbehavior, CPJ said in its 2001 country report.

PAKISTAN:

Pakistan, which recently privatized its radio and television, is undergoing a major transition that would benefit greatly from U.S. assistance. Internews has a proposal pending at OSI as this report goes to press (April 2002) to conduct a media assessment in Pakistan. To be sure, Americans working in this region are under intense security threat, as Daniel Pearl's murder has dramatized. Collaboration with other foreign and local groups may help ease the danger while still offering American assistance where it is so urgently needed. Newspapers in Pakistan have long been in a legal state of limbo. The licensing law was revoked years ago, and the only legal power officials have had over the print press is delaying power. "If you don't get a license, you wait four months and it's assumed you have a license," said Owais Aslam Ali, who heads his family's news agency and also the Pakistan Press Foundation. (17) The laws are ok, but the implementation is not good, he said. There are four influential newspaper barons. Most of the press freedom problems here could be solved by more training, he said. In Pakistan and India 90% of the readers are in Urdu, and those newspapers don't carry international news, Ali said. Below the news radar screen entirely are the 65% of the population who don't read or write.

NEPAL:

Before the 2001 royal assassinations and upheaval in Nepal, media were relatively free except when reporting on the Maoist insurgency, in which case they faced government prosecution. The Nepal Press Institute was established in 1984 by media professionals to help expand the country's 100-year-old newspaper industry with training and other services. The popular Gaon Ghar newspaper was created with colorful graphics and large fonts to reach rural villages in 75 Nepali districts. Similar projects have been undertaken in Bangladesh, India and Pakistan, according to the World Bank. But the June 1, 2001 assassinations were not credibly explained by the government, which led to a period of wild conspiracy theories. In November most of the country's civil liberties were suspended, and more than 50 journalists were arrested, according to CPJ. The international community failed to help them, and a U.S. official even stated that "we hear from most mainstream journalists in Nepal that they're confident that they and their work will not be affected by the restrictions." This was "met with surprise and frustration" by the country's leading journalists, CPJ said in its 2001 annual report.

SOUTHEAST ASIA

BURMA (MYANMAR):

CPJ's 2001 annual report singles out Burma as one of the worst places to try to practice journalism, a place "where one of the world's most repressive dictatorships does its best to ensure that local newspapers carry anything but news." The Ministry of Information and Culture runs the largest television station, and the military controls the second largest. Even so, OSI and SEAPA are active in supporting the Burmese press. The Burmese Independent News Agency (BINA) covers Burma from Thailand, which is also were most of the media assistance organizations are headquartered. Kavi Chongkittavorn is well versed on media developments here. The release of Aung San Suu Kyi at press time may signal new opportunities for a less repressive regime and more open media.

CAMBODIA:

This is now one of the "trendy capitals" for media development. Knight fellow Ann Olson has moved here from Russia to take over the IJF's Center for Independent Journalism. Even Internews is now looking into starting a program in Indonesia. (18) There is a relatively open, "raw" situation, Kavi Chongkittavorn said, with very little media restraints except defaming the King. In the competition for foreign media aid, a game is played here in which local journalists "attack the King, the newspapers are shut down, and international media organizations come in," he said. At the same time, Cambodia's six competing media advocacy organizations "fight among themselves, so the government has its way." (19) As a result, it is better to partner with the tried-and-true IJF and SEAPA for training, which is needed particularly to promote investigative journalism against corruption.

INDONESIA:

SEAPA has branches in East Timor and Jakarta. Internews has run $17 million in USAID-funded programs here since 1998, supporting the emergence of television stations across Southeast Asia and building the first television schools. It also has created radio programming for over 100 radio stations. In coordination with an Indonesia's women's rights organization, Yayasan Jurnal Perempuan, Internews helped create Indonesia's first women's radio program, which reaches an estimated audience of about 5 million women. (20) That project was funded by USAID and the Royal Dutch Embassy of Indonesia. Internews also played an important role in creating national television and radio in East Timor, together with the United Nations. Another Internews project, "Reporting for Peace," teaches journalists how to cover conflict without inciting more violence. USAID provided presses to a consortium in East Timor. The Indonesian press is not especially ethical, professional or responsible. Many journalists take bribes. Self-censorship is common, particularly when reporting on religious conflict. Yet after the 9/11 terrorist attacks in the U.S., the mainstream Indonesian press reported that Israel, or "the Jews" were responsible, CPJ noted. This led to anti-U.S. demonstrations all across Indonesia, which is the world's largest Muslim country.

MALAYSIA:

The press are strictly controlled here and almost no independent news is allowed. CPJ observes that "the sole bright spot in this bleak landscape is the Internet, which has thus far escaped government control or censorship, largely because Mahathir wishes to attract foreign investment." (21)

PHILIPPINES:

The media are relatively free here. A study of Southeast Asian countries ranked the Philippines highest in making public records available. (22) The Freedom Forum's Internet Library project is ending due to the cutoff of funds. (23) A number of U.S. organizations help media here, in a relatively pro-American environment. The American Enterprise Institute ran a series on access to economic information, working with the local Center for Media Freedom and Responsibility. (24)

SINGAPORE: The strict government puts so much heat on media here that MediaWatch, a nonprofit group created in March 2001 to improve professional journalism standards, had to close seven months later. Donors "refused to finance MediaWatch's budget of $122,500 because they considered media watching a political exercise," concluded Lauren Ross of Internews. Even when MediaWatch pledged to focus on a wide spectrum of news, rather than political news, it was still unable to go forward. MediaWatch chairman Tan Chong Kee had hoped to produce an annual report on the media situation in Singapore. Tan concluded that he would discontinue advocacy work.

THAILAND:

Until recently, the Thai press was considered one of the freest and strongest in Southeast Asia. But Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, the country's richest man and telecommunications czar, came to power last year and now has reversed hard-won media freedoms established in the country's 1997 reform constitution, according to Kavi Chongkittavorn, founder of the Thai Journalists' Association. Shinawatra has harassed foreign journalists from the Far Eastern Economic Review and the Economist. He bought Thailand's only privately owned independent station, iTV, and used his influence to monopolize the news flow and win the election. Ngos have been more active than the U.S. government in media development here. (25) The Freedom Forum's Internet Library project was cancelled due to the cutbacks. FF had invested $50,000 in establishing a headquarters for the Thai Journalists' Association before canceling all if its foreign programs. Canadian training in television and broadcasting five years ago led to the formation of the Thai Broadcasters' Association. "Thai journalists don't have proper training, and those who have proper training aren't very good," according to Chongkittavorn. His Thai Journalists' Association, the most respected national journalist group in Southeast Asia, tries to address that need by bringing academics and journalists together to create mid-career training courses. One good workshop was "Ask the Right Question."

VIETNAM:

Despite Vietnam's interest in rapprochement with the West, the state owns all the country's nearly 500 media outlets and restricts what journalists can publish. In October 2001 the government even started requiring that all foreign news video being transmitted out of Vietnam be inspected first by the government. (26)

NORTH ASIA

NORTH KOREA:

This is not a fertile area for any Western training. Everything is strictly controlled by the Communist government. The movement of foreign journalists in the country is highly restricted and monitored, and local media weren't even allowed to cover the historic trip by their leader, Kim Jong Il, across China. The People's Republic of Korea restricts access to the Internet under criminal law. Harsh penal codes punish people for listening to foreign broadcasts or possessing dissident publications as crimes against the state, punishable by death, according to CPJ's 2001 survey.

SOUTH KOREA:

In the 1960s the government gave away radio receivers as part of a literacy campaign, which inspired the expansion of community radio. A liberalized newspaper licensing law in 1987 unleashed the press. Now publishers simply have to inform the government that they plan to publish a newspaper. The number of daily newspapers grew from 6 to 17 in Seoul alone, and the papers became more diverse all over the country. (27)

MONGOLIA:

While media are relatively free here, they reflect a lack of professional journalism training or public interest mission. Journalists worry that the growth of a sex-oriented tabloid press will lead to government censorship of all media. The new private radio stations in Ulaanbaatar are primarily all music stations, and none do significant news/information programming, according to OSI. There are remaining opportunities for effective media development. Bill Siemering of OSI and Knight fellow Corey Flintoff of NPR were involved here in a successful rural radio project here to serve the nomadic herders in the countryside. OSI's Mongolian ngo, the Mongolian Foundation for Open Society (MFOS), provided equipment, studio renovations etc. to create five local radio stations responsive to community needs. Two Mongolian trainers spent two years at the University of Missouri; which together with IRE helped develop course materials. Now a local Press Institute offers a nine-month training course and an Internet Center for journalists. MFOS also awards grants to newspapers to improve the editorial quality of their papers. Other partners developing radio here include UNESCO and USAID. Another local partner is the Press Institute of Mongolia.

CHINA:

China will always be in a class by itself. CPJ cautions that China is the "world's leading jailer of journalists." (28) Some media openness is allowed, but the danger is always present. China's keen interest in participating in the Internet and the world economy provides an unprecedented opportunity for media development. The success last fall of AOL Time Warner and Rupert Murdoch in establishing commercial contracts for doing media business in the part of mainland China closest to Hong Kong may provide the foot in the door for other independent media in China. But Murdoch's deal came at a price, which Murdoch didn't seem to mind but which others considered a betrayal of the international media community. Murdoch dropped the BBC from his China network when Chinese officials complained about its news coverage.

KEY MEDIA DEVELOPMENT CONTACTS IN ASIA

1. Ying Chan, Hong Kong University yychan@hku.hk
2. Kavi Chongkittavorn, SEAPA, Thai Journalists' Association kavi@nationgroup.com
3. Ed Girardet, Media Action International, Pakistan
4. Azer Hasret, Central Asian and Southern Caucuses Freedom of Expression Network, Baku, Azerbaijan. hasret@azeurotel.com
5. Anthony Kuhn, Los Angeles Times Beijing bureau chief
6. Lin Neumann, Committee to Protect Journalists lin_neumann@csi.com
7. Anthony Richter, OSI Central Eurasia Project, New York dsershen@sorosny.org
8. Barney Rubin, Council on Foreign Relations, New York (expert on Afghanistan)
9. Ahmed Rashid, Wall Street Journal, (expert on Afghanistan)
10. Bill Siemering, OSI Philadelphia (community radio) Siemering@attglobal.net
11. Arnold Zeitlin, former Freedom Forum (Hong Kong), azeitlin@hotmail.com He was developing Internet libraries for journalists around Asia when Freedom Forum pulled the plug on all of its foreign programs.

KEY MEDIA DEVELOPMENT ORGANIZATIONS IN ASIA

1. The Baltic Media Center, funded by the Danish government, is working on developing independent radio in Afghanistan. http://www.bmc.dk
2. Central Asian and Southern Caucuses Freedom of Expression Network. (CASCFEN). The group, based in Baku, Azerbaijan, is headed by Azer H. Hasret, who is head of the Azerbaijan press group IPIANC. hasret@azeurotel.com
3. Center for Media Freedom and Responsibility in Manila monitors and protects Philippine journalists. http://www.cmfr.com.ph
4. The Freedom Forum which used to spend $100,000 a year in Asia, is pulling out. It invested in April 2001 $50,000 for a new Thai Journalists' Association headquarters, as well as substantial funds for Internet libraries for journalists, and other projects. Its Asia library, in Hong Kong, will be taken over by Hong Kong University.
5. Hong Kong University is "an outstanding example of bringing together academic and working journalists for training. It should be a model for other Asian, and for that matter, other global institutions," Zeitlin said. HKU has taken over the Freedom Forum's library. Contact: Ying Chan yychan@hku.hk
6. Internews provides regular journalism training and legal assistance through its local organizations in Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyz Republic, Thailand, East Timor, Tajikistan, and Indonesia. It launched the first all-woman radio show in Indonesia, helped draft the broadcast media law for East Timor on behalf of the United National Transitional Authority there, established a media resource center in Chiang Mai, northern Thailand, and helped bring together Tajikistan's independent media to form the National Association of Independent Mass Media in Tajikistan in 1999. In Afghanistan, Internews is working to revive the Afghan Media Center and to set up a radio network and is helping local journalists with grants from its Open Media Fund for Afghanistan, funded in part by author Ahmed Rashid. http://www.internews.org
7. Mongolia Foundation for Open Society (OSI). NPR's Bill Siemering guided a rural radio project here that involved Knight fellow Corey Flintoff, the University of Missouri and IRE. It also is working on upgrading print journalism. http://www.soros.org
8. Southeast Asia Press Association (SEAPA) is the most important media organization in the region. When press organizations from neighboring countries didn't work well together, and international aid organizations were dismissed by the regional governments as "Western colonialism," SEAPA was set up like a local Committee to Protect Journalists. The World Press Freedom Committee had intended to set up its own office in the region, but decided that as an indigenous group, SEAPA would be more effective. Contact: Chavarong Limpattamaponee, http://www.seapa.org
9. Thai Journalists' Association in Bangkok is an exceptionally good local press organization in Southeast Asia, where others may be corrupt and inefficient. Founder Kavi Chongkittavorn also created the regional SEAPA. Contact: Kavi Chongkittavorn, kavi@nationgroup.com, http://www.tja.or.th
10. Thomson Foundation, a U.K. media development group headquartered in Wales, has done some work in China. enquiries@thomfound.co.uk
11. University of Missouri professors trained journalists from Mongolia at the U.S. campus for two years and also in China, with counterparts from the University of Denver, at the Guangzhou Daily. They are interested in starting programs in Indonesia as well.