Analytical Information Agency, Russia
May 7 2004
Russia’s 8th amid CIS countries in industrial production growth in Q1.
Russia was the eighth amid CIS countries with 7.6% industrial
production growth in Q1, according to the preliminary data of the CIS
Statistics Committee.
Only Azerbaijan (4.2%) and Armenia (2.8%) were behind. No data on
Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan is available.
Ukraine is still the growth leader (+18.8%), Georgian is the 2nd
(+17.3%), Moldova – the 3rd (+16.7%).
The average growth for ten CIS countries stood at 9% in Q1 vs. 7% a
year earlier.

Baku Today, Azerbaijan
May 7 2004
Armenia’s Returning Occupied Districts To Be Debated In Strasbourg
Meeting
Yerevan’s releasing seven occupied Azerbaijani districts in return
for the latter’s opening communication links to Armenia will be
discussed during the foreign ministers Elmar Mammadyarov and Vardan
Oskanian’s upcoming meeting.
The meeting planned to be held in Strasbourg on May 12, the 525th
newspaper reported on Friday, citing Mammadyarov.
Mammadyarov said that the peace nogotiations would not be continued
unless they yield tangible results.
`We should not hold meetings just for the sake of meetings,’
Mammadyarov said, adding that the sides would define directions for
future negotiations in Strasbourg.
The Azeri foreign minister said the Strasbourg meeting would be
attended also by the OSCE Minsk group’s co-chairs, and special
representatives of the both conflicting countries.
President Ilham Aliyev also stated on Wednesday that his government
hopes for finding a peaceful solution to Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.
The president said if there were no hope, he wouldn’t keep supporting
the talks.
Armenia occupied Azerbaijan’s former autonomous region of
Nagorno-Karabakh and also seven districts surrounding it in 1991-94
war. Despite a shaky seace-fire signed between the two countries on
12 May 1994, the peace talks mediated by OSCE’s Minsk group have
failed to find a settlement to the conflict.

A1 Plus | 16:00:09 | 07-05-2004 | Politics |
HARUTYUN ARAKELYAN FINDS NO USE OF PRESIDENT KOCHARYAN’S RESIGNATION
Armenian Ramkavar-Azatakan Party leader Harutyun Arakelyan convened a news
conference to say that confidence referendum could lead the country to
deadlock. He offers constitutional referendum instead.
Speaking on National Assembly, he said, in his opinion, its seats should be
filled only through party lists.
As always, Arakelyan criticized the ruling coalition, this time referring to
the party-conducted survey, which showed 60% of respondents were opposed to
the coalition government.
He voiced disapproval over the idea of president Kocharyan’s resignation.
“Will all problems be solved if Kocharyan resigns?” he asked.
Arakelyan was reluctant to speak also on the party’s internal troubles. Four
members were dropped out of the party because of the party charter
violation, he said without specifying their exact wrongdoing.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

Turkish Daily News
May 7 2004
Azerbaijan, Turkey not to sour ties over KKTC seat rejection
Azeri Foreign Ministry says attitude of Azeri deputies at the Council
of Europe Parliamentary Assembly does not reflect their country’s
stance on Cyprus while Foreign Minister Gul calls on people not to
rake up the issue
Azerbaijan’s Foreign Ministry said the attitude and statements of
Azeri deputies at the Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly did
not reflect their country’s policy on Cyprus, following rejection of
a resolution to grant seats for Turkish Cypriot deputies after Azeri
parliamentarians didn’t attend the voting.
The statement released by the Azeri Foreign Ministry on Wednesday
emphasized the friendly and historical ties between the two
countries, adding, “It is not true that the bilateral relations have
been damaged due to the fact that some Azeri deputies did not attend
the voting.”
The Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly rejected a draft
resolution on April 29 designed to allow deputies from Turkish
Republic of Northern Cyprus (KKTC), which lacks international
recognition, to attend and participate in the assembly’s meetings.
The reversal came after eight deputies from Azerbaijan, which
previously pledged strong support for efforts to end isolation of
Turkish Cypriots, did not attend the voting.
Instead, the assembly voted on an amendment proposal which called for
closer relations with Turkish Cypriot parliamentarians in the body
and which envisaged placing Turkish Cypriot parliamentarians among
the Greek Cypriot delegation within the Council.
Head of the Azeri delegation in the Parliamentary Assembly of the
Council of Europe said earlier this week that the Azeri deputies had
consciously avoided to attend, explaining that the success of the
draft resolution would have set a dangerous precedence that could
later allow Armenian deputies from Nagorno-Karabakh to attend Council
of Europe meetings.
Nagorno-Karabakh, an Armenian enclave in Azerbaijan, has been under
Armenian invasion since the beginning of the last decade.
The Azeri position sparked huge disappointment and reaction
especially among the Turkish media.
“The attitude of the Azeri deputies should not be interpreted as a
sign of a shift in political relations between the brother countries
of Turkey and Azerbaijan,” read the statement.
It was also noted that Azerbaijan has always been in favor of a
solution on the divided island of Cyprus.
A U.N. plan to reunify the island was defeated in twin referenda at
the end of last month due to a strong Greek Cypriot rejection
although Turkish Cypriots voted overwhelmingly in favor of a united
Cyprus.
Azeri President Ilham Aliyev said the no-show of the Azeri deputies
was to be blamed on poor coordination between Turkish and Azeri
delegations and added that the Azeri delegation should have been
better informed on the vote.
Gul advises calm
Meanwhile, Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul advised calm on the matter.
Replying to questions prior to leaving for Dublin for a
EU-Mediterranean meeting on Wednesday, he said Turkey had some
expectations from “friend and brother countries,” referring to
Azerbaijan.
Recalling the rejection of the resolution, Gul went on to say, “The
only point I feel sorry about is that this resolution has been the
best one in favor of Turkish Cypriots to date. It seemed as if there
happened something against the Turkish Cypriots. However, there is
nothing like that.”
Gul called on people not to rake up the Azeri’s not attending the
voting, saying, “There is no need to further sadden people from both
countries by meddling with the issue too much. Everyone should derive
lessons from this.”
“I hope the Azeri deputies’ move was not done on purpose. Now, we
expect more support in the coming meetings. What happened has
happened,” Gul added.

A1 Plus | 17:39:30 | 07-05-2004 | Politics |
NATALIA VUTOVA SPEAKING AT NEWS CONFERENCE
On Friday, the CE Special Envoy in Armenia Natalia Vutova, speaking at a
news conference in Yerevan, said there was nothing surprising, when the CE
member countries put their domestic troubles on PACE floor, and this has
never been considered as treason in any of 45 member countries, but Armenia.
Speaking on the PACE recent resolution on situation in Armenia, Vutova found
it irrelevant to speak about the opposition’s or the authorities’ defeat or
victory. The resolution calls on both sides to start a dialogue, she said
invoking Human Rights Convention’s provision of freedom of speech.
It was noted that, contrary to Venice Commission experts’ negative opinion,
Armenian authorities adopted the law on rallies, demonstrations and marches.
“We will continue to negotiate with the authorities for amending the law. It
must be based on Human Rights International Convention”, she said.
Responding to some Armenian officials’ attempts to play down the
significance of the resolution, because, as they say, it is grounded on
facts obtained from unreliable sources, Vutova said the CE is always
verifying the information given.

A1 Plus | 14:57:01 | 07-05-2004 | Social |
ARMENIAN STUDENTS TO HEAD TO SHUSHI
On Armenian Polytechnic University initiative, fifty students will start
procession on May 9 following the 1992 route of the Armenian National Army.
The students will take their route to Shushi fortress and then to St.
Ghazanchetsi Church.
Nagorno-Karabakhi students are expected to join the march.

A1 Plus | 18:32:24 | 07-05-2004 | Politics |
AUTHORITIES HAVE NO INTENTION TO FULFIL THEIR CE COMMITMENTS
Republic party came up with a statement Friday pointing out facts of
Armenian Constitution and PACE 1374 resolution violation by Armenian
authorities.
In a clear breach of the Constitution and the PACE above- mentioned
resolution,
Yerevan Municipality refused to authorize peaceful rally;
On May 4, roads to Armenian capital were blocked in a bid to prevent people
from attending the rally;
New arrests were made;
Political prisoners’ motions to release them from pre-trial detention were
denied;
Media outlets were bared from operating.

PRESS RELEASE
May 7, 2004
Embassy of the Republic of Armenia
2225 R Street, NW, Washington, DC, 20008
Tel: 202-319-1976, x. 348; Fax: 202-319-2982
Email: [email protected]; Web:
Armenia Qualifies for Millennium Challenge Account Funds, More U.S. Aid
The U.S. Millennium Challenge Corporation, that governs the new tool for
U.S. foreign aid process called the Millennium Challenge Account (MCA),
announced on May 6, 2004 that 16 countries, including Armenia, were selected
as potential recipients of MCA funds. The decision on qualifying Armenia and
other countries as a recipient was made based on Armenia’s performance in
three categories of indicators, namely economic freedom and reforms;
governance practices; and commitment to human and social development.
The MCA funds for the Fiscal Year 2004 are over 1 billion dollars, and the
Bush Administration’s request for FY2005 is 2.5 billion dollars. The MCA has
been proposed and established in 2003 to distribute more U.S. foreign aid to
the development and transition countries based on merit criteria, such as
their adherence to conducting economic reforms, implementing sound economic
policies, combating corruption, promoting rule of law, and investing in
country’s human potential, i.e., education and health care. The countries
eligible for MCA in 2004 will still need to present formal programs, called
compacts, to receive the funds; the compacts need to be approved by the
Board of the Millennium Challenge Corporation.
According to Armenia’s Ambassador to the U.S., Dr. Arman Kirakossian,
Armenia’s eligibility for MCA reflects the solid commitment of the people
and the government of Armenia to promote economic growth, reduce poverty,
and continue the democratic transition. “Armenia’s inclusion in this list is
an acknowledgement of the faith our U.S. partners have in Armenia’s ability
to help itself,” Ambassador Kirakossian concluded. “The United States has
helped Armenia’s democratic and economic transition since its independence,”
he noted, “and we are grateful to the American people for their commitment
to helping Armenia build a brighter future.”
For more information on the MCA, visit the Millennium Challenge Corporation’s
website at

ARMENIAN RULING COALITION AND OPPOSITION TO CREATE “NEW POLITICAL SITUATION”
07.05.2004 13:20
/PanARMENIAN.Net/ The ruling coalition of Armenia, the united opposition as
well as the Independent United Labor Party and National Deputy parliamentary
faction acknowledged the necessity of creating a new political situation in
Armenia, the joint statement of the Armenian parliamentary factions adopted
yesterday evening on completion of 5-hour negotiations says. The parties
agreed on continuation of political consultations and formation of an agenda
on the basis of former statements of the coalition and opposition. As
secretary of Justice opposition bloc Victor Dallakian told the journalists,
about 30 issues, including the PACE resolution on domestic situation in
Armenia, have been submitted to discussion. To remind, political
consultations are continued today.

Radio Free Europe, Czech Republic
May 7 2004
“Broadcasting to Hotspots: RFE/RL Today”
Woodrow Wilson Center
Thomas A. Dine President, RFE/RL, Inc.
There’s a Washington conversation that I have over and over again.
Someone asks me what I do. I say, “I’m the head of Radio Free
Europe/Radio Liberty.” The person then says one of two things: “I
didn’t know Radio Free Europe still existed,” or “But isn’t Europe
already free?” Today I want to address these misconceptions about
RFE/RL: that Europe is free; that RFE/RL focuses solely on Europe; in
short, that RFE/RL is a Cold War relic and not relevant to today’s
world.
To start, though, let me give you a brief overview of who we are.
RFE/RL broadcasts to 19 countries in 28 languages, none of which is
English. 19 of our 28 language services are directed at
majority-Muslim populations. We have bureaus in every one of our
countries but Iran and Turkmenistan.
We are a “surrogate broadcaster,” which means that our mission,
unlike that of Voice of America, is to broadcast news and information
about the individual countries listening to us, not about the United
States-unless the news from Washington involves one or more of our
countries. In addition to radio, RFE/RL is very prominent on the
Internet-nearly all of our broadcast services operate top-notch
local-language websites, and our main website averages about 6
million page views a month. We are also on television in a handful of
countries.
Let me now address the first question, “Isn’t Europe already free?”
People often forget that the eastern border of Europe is not Warsaw
or Bucharest or even St. Petersburg-it’s the Ural Mountains, two time
zones east of Moscow. To put it another way-the geographic center of
Europe isn’t Germany or Austria. It’s Ukraine. We can divide our
European countries into two groups: the former Yugoslavia and the
former Soviet Union.
It is a mistake to believe that the arrest of Milosevic marked the
end of the turmoil in the former Yugoslavia. Most of it is
politically and economically crippled; the odds of further ethnic
bloodshed are high; corruption is pervasive; and the emergence of a
free press has been stunted.
In Serbia, the euphoria that greeted the ouster of Milosevic has
given way to a prevailing attitude that can best be described as a
noxious brew of nationalism and self-pity. The strongest party is now
the ultra-nationalistic Serbian Radical Party, and vestiges of
Milosevic’s criminal regime survive nearly intact-the assassination
of Prime Minister Djindjic last year was merely the most tragic
example of its continuing influence. Meanwhile, the economy is a
shambles, and since foreign investors want little to do with Serbia,
there is no improvement in sight.
Furthermore, Serbia’s territorial integrity is anything but certain.
In Montenegro, about half the people want to secede from the
federation with Serbia, while the other half want to stay. And in
Kosovo, the worst ethnic violence since NATO’s military action
erupted in March of this year. Analysts say that, far from being an
isolated incident, this latest outbreak of hostilities was the tip of
the iceberg. When you consider that unemployment in Kosovo is between
60% and 70%, and that a majority of the population lives in poverty,
it’s hard to be hopeful that tolerance will prevail. If ethnic
violence does recur in Kosovo, it will certainly destabilize another
of our broadcast countries-Macedonia-where 25% of the population is
ethnic Albanian.
Finally, Bosnia and Herzegovina has also been unable to move beyond
nationality-based infighting. Local government bodies are strictly
loyal to members of their own nationality, and the nationalistic
ruling parties resist market reforms because they fear they will lose
their grip on power. For the politicians in power in Bosnia, the war
is not over, but merely in remission.
The reason RFE/RL plays such a critical role in the Balkans is that
it is the only local-language media outlet that speaks to, and for,
all the ethnic groups; the rest of the media have come to serve as
inflammatory voices of intolerance. The uniqueness of our programming
is reflected in our outstanding ratings-our numbers in the former
Yugoslavia are consistently among the highest in our broadcast
portfolio.
The second group of our European countries is, as I mentioned, the
former Soviet Union, and, if I haven’t depressed you enough already,
I have to tell you that the former Soviet Union makes the former
Yugoslavia look like Switzerland. Everyone in this room remembers the
sense of hope we felt when the U.S.S.R. collapsed. Fifteen nations
had been freed from Moscow’s control, and each of them would pursue
its own path not only towards an independent national identity, but
towards freedom and democracy. Alas, with the exception of the three
Baltic republics, the freedom-and-democracy part hasn’t proven true.
Let’s begin with the three countries of the Caucasus, where our
weekly listenership ratings are very high, close to 20%. When the
Soviet Union collapsed, Armenia was certainly considered one of the
republics likeliest to succeed. It was a Christian country with close
ties to the West, a highly educated populace, and a cohesive,
talented diaspora. But, after an initial period of reform, Armenia
has regressed into a corrupt oligarchy. No wonder it has lost nearly
a third of its population to emigration since 1992.
Azerbaijan, too, seemed promising, mainly because western investors
were flocking there for its oil. However, it, too, has succumbed to
oligarchy, and in fact last year, Azerbaijan earned the dubious
distinction of becoming the first former Soviet republic in which
power was transferred from father to son.
To complete the Caucasian triumvirate: Georgia experienced happy news
at the end of last year, when a peaceful protest movement led to the
collapse of Eduard Shevardnadze’s corrupt government, and the
election of a true democrat, Mikhail Saakashvili, to the presidency.
Unfortunately, President Saakashvili has inherited a mess. Two
provinces want to secede from Georgia and unite with Russia; a third
region, Adjaria, has demanded more independence from Tbilisi; its
infrastructure is decimated; and corruption is endemic among its
workforce.
In the early hours of this morning, the Adjaria crisis came to an end
when its warlord was persuaded by Minister Ivanov of Russia to step
down and seek asylum in Moscow. Our Georgian Service broadcast all
last night and this morning, live.
The next country in RFE/RL’s European portfolio, Moldova, is the
poorest nation in Europe. In 2001, Moldova became the first former
Soviet state to elect an unreformed Communist president; every year,
President Voronin pays his respects at the monument to Lenin in the
capital. To visit Moldova is to take a trip to a Twilight Zone in
which there are lots of old people, lots of children, and almost no
one in between-they’ve all left to go find work in other countries.
Over the last our years, our Moldovan Service has doubled its
listenership.
Further north, we have Belarus, Europe’s most repressive nation.
Belarus is run by a psychopath named Alexander Lukashenka, who openly
admires Stalin and who did business with Saddam Hussein. Needless to
say, Lukashenka isn’t very fond of RFE/RL, which is probably why this
year our Minsk bureau has been burglarized, threatened with eviction,
and visited by the tax police.
Russia is one of the great underreported stories in the world today.
Here we have a former superpower that, having experimented with
democracy, has reverted to autocracy. My Moscow colleagues tell me
that they have not felt such a climate of enforced orthodoxy since
the 1970s. Putin is so powerful, and so feared, that no one in the
Russian government arrives at work before noon, and no one leaves
before 10 p.m.-because that is the schedule that Putin keeps. The
last time the Kremlin observed this ominous practice was during the
rule of Stalin.
Just this week, the Committee to Protect Journalists named Russia one
of the ten worst places in the world to be a journalist, citing
President Putin’s use of sham lawsuits and corporate maneuvers to
virtually eliminate independent media. Television and radio are now
little more than an arm of the Kremlin. Meanwhile, Putin continues to
go to great lengths to obstruct coverage of the war in Chechnya,
something we at RFE/RL experienced in 2000, when our reporter Andrei
Babitsky was kidnapped in Chechnya by Russian FSB, disappeared for
over 5 weeks, and finally dumped out of the trunk of a car in
Mahashkala, Dagestan one cold February day.
We complete this survey of our European broadcast area with the
biggest disappointment of all: Ukraine. With a well-educated
population of 48 million, Ukraine had the potential to become one of
the great nations of Europe. Instead, under the corrupt rule of
President Leonid Kuchma, Ukraine has become an embarrassment. It has
forged commercial relationships with Iran, Syria, Libya, and Iraq.
The Kuchma administration has also aggressively subverted the
democratic process, employing an array of dirty tricks and brutal
tactics. It is no wonder that “Ukraine fatigue” has become a term of
art in the State Department and at the EU.
Ukraine will elect a new president in October. But Kuchma is so
determined to keep his cronies in power that he has unleashed a
severe crackdown on independent media-and his main target is RFE/RL.
In February, our most important affiliate network in Ukraine, after
being taken over by supporters of Kuchma, kicked us off the air. In
March, a Kyiv station that had begun to air RFE/RL programming two
days earlier was raided and closed by the authorities. And on that
very same day, the director of another station was killed in a car
accident while on his way to a meeting with an RFE/RL representative.
With an election just months away, Kuchma feels he cannot afford to
have RFE/RL around.
I give you this tour of Eastern Europe not only to show that Europe
is not free, but because something very important is at stake here.
Right now, the United States is engaged in a massive effort to
promote democracy in the Middle East. But I worry that by focusing on
the Middle East, we are neglecting to finish the job much closer to
home, in Eastern Europe. We suffer from a sort of “political
attention deficit disorder”; we pay attention whenever missiles are
launched, but once the bombs stop falling, we stop watching. Most
Americans think that Europe has been taken care of, and we can now
move on to the Middle East. But, as I have just described, a large
part of Europe has not been taken care of.
Furthermore, experts agree that one of the pillars of Putin’s
political identity going forward will be an increasingly assertive
foreign policy in places that used to report to Moscow. Since the
former republics of the Soviet Union have such shoddy governments
now, and are in such dire straits economically, I am very
apprehensive about what Eastern Europe may look like in the near
future. We cannot discount the possibility that not one but several
dictatorships will be reborn in the heart of Europe.
***
To address the second widespread misconception about RFE/RL, that we
are solely engaged with Europe: the facts are otherwise. About half
of the countries to which we broadcast are in Asia. And they, too,
desperately need what RFE/RL offers.
Let’s start with Iran, because this has been a depressing talk so
far, and Iran is a country I have high hopes for-an exciting
crucible. Iran may be run by religious fanatics, but its population
is young, pro-West, and pro-democracy. 70% of the Iranian population
is under the age of 30. The regime is doomed, as a simple matter of
demographics.
Because of the extraordinarily youthful skew of Iran’s population, we
decided to try something a little different with Iran. In December of
2002, we launched a joint venture with our sister entity, Voice of
America, called Radio Farda. Radio Farda is a 24-hours-a-day,
7-days-a-week station that combines, in a fast-paced format, eight
hours of serious news coverage each day with a mix of Western and
Iranian pop music.
The response has been extraordinary: over 20% of Iranians between the
ages of 18 and 29 listen to Radio Farda at least once a week. Over
40,000 visitors a day use the Farda website to listen to the station
over the Internet. Thousands of messages a week pour into Farda’s
telephone call-in service. And 76% of the Iranian people consider it
a reliable source of news and information. So much for the Great
Satan. The theocrats are obviously scared, and last year they started
jamming Farda’s broadcast signal, blocking access to its website, and
incarcerating our correspondents.
Another Asian hotspot is Afghanistan. In the wake of the 9/11
terrorist attacks, members of the House of Representatives asked us
to create a broadcast service to Afghanistan. Four months after the
attacks, Radio Free Afghanistan was up and running, broadcasting 12
hours a day in Dari and Pashto to that beleaguered country.
Reminiscent of scenes in movies when someone who’s been crawling
through the desert for days finally finds water and gulps it down
with tremendous intensity, the response to our broadcasts in
Afghanistan has been overwhelming. This is because under the Taliban,
the people weren’t just denied objective news and information-they
were denied radios. In Kabul now, 54% of Afghans listen to us weekly,
and in the northern city of Mazar-e Sharif that figure climbs to 68%.
Nothing in my job makes me happier than reading the messages we get
from our listeners, male and female. Radio Free Afghanistan has made
an immediate difference in the lives of the newly free Afghan people.
But recall the “political A.D.D.” that I mentioned earlier. I am
worried that the United States and its allies are not following
through on their promise to rebuild the country. Afghanistan today
does not have functioning institutions. Outside Kabul, security is
worse than it was under the Taliban. Aid workers are being murdered
at an alarming rate, and as a result relief organizations are
drastically scaling back operations. The capital barely has contact
with, let alone control over, the rest of the country, which is run
by regional warlords. And our correspondents believe the Taliban is
regrouping. Obviously, Afghanistan will remain one of our most
important broadcast targets for years to come.
I’m going to skip over Iraq, where we broadcast in Arabic and
Kurdish, for two reasons. First, I think it’s safe to say that
everyone in this room is well aware of what’s going on there. Second,
to my enormous regret, the Administration’s FY05 budget calls for the
termination of Radio Free Iraq at the end of this fiscal year. It is
now up to Congress to decide whether to acquiesce or continue funding
it to the tune of $2.2 million a year. Whatever the outcome, I am
delighted with what RFI has accomplished in its five years; the
latest research shows that a whopping 34.4% of Iraqis listen to us
each week.
I’ll conclude this tour of our Asian broadcast area with the five
Central Asian former republics of the Soviet Union: Kazakhstan,
Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan.
The most benign of the bunch are Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, where
reporters do operate with relative autonomy, provided that they don’t
make any trouble for the people in power. Unfortunately, that’s as
good as it gets in Central Asia today. Each of the other three states
has, since obtaining independence from Moscow, morphed into a
post-Soviet version of The Sopranos, where one crime family rules
through intimidation and violence.
In Kazakhstan, it’s the Nazarbayev family, and they don’t like it
when journalists stick their noses in their business. In the last
three years, newspapers have been burglarized, their employees
beaten, and their offices burned to the ground. Three independent TV
stations were shut down in 2002 alone. Journalists who dare
investigate the corrupt business practices of the Nazarbayev family
are sent to jail. Soon RFE/RL may be the only independent media
outlet operating in Kazakhstan-the rest are all controlled by the
President’s daughter, Darigha.
Uzbekistan is run by the Karimov family, and conditions there are
worse than they are in Kazakhstan. Journalists who report on the
crime, corruption, and poverty plaguing Uzbekistan are routinely
fired-and they’re the lucky ones; many have been arrested, injured,
and jailed. In many cases, it is publicity by RFE/RL that saves these
brave journalists from lengthier prison sentences. I myself felt a
surge of intense contempt for the Uzbek regime last year, when a
group of 20 thugs, no doubt working for the government, surrounded
one of our correspondents as he reported on an incident at Tashkent’s
central market, beat him, and stole his equipment.
The final Mafia state in Central Asia is Turkmenistan, and, though it
may be hard to believe after the foregoing discussion, Turkmenistan
is the worst of all of them. The dictator of Turkmenistan, Saparmurat
Niyazov, has constructed a cult of personality there that would have
made Romania’s Ceausescu blush. Every newspaper lists Niyazov as its
founder. All editors are personally appointed by Niyazov. Censorship
is total. The most important news story, every day, is the
magnificence of Niyazov.
We have correspondents in Turkmenistan, but they must work in secret,
using pseudonyms. Unfortunately, they do not always succeed in
remaining anonymous. In the past year alone, several of our reporters
in Turkmenistan have been abducted, beaten, and jailed. And our
stringer in Moscow was savagely beaten just last week. That these
brave men and women are willing to risk their lives so that their
compatriots can at least hear a little bit of truth every day never
fails to move me. They are true heroes.
As you can see, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty has as much to do
with Asia as it does with Europe. In fact, since we are funded by the
government, our priorities as an organization largely track its
priorities, and right now the biggest priority of the government is
combating terrorism. That’s why I always have to laugh when people
claim that RFE/RL is a relic-especially since 19 of our 28 broadcast
languages are directed at predominantly-Muslim populations.
In fact, as part of the War on Terror, RFE/RL hopes to redouble its
radio, television, and Internet efforts to the five Central Asian
states over the next 12 months. Although these former Soviet states
may seem to have little to do with Islamist terrorism, we at RFE/RL
believe that Central Asia could well be the next front in the global
War on Terror. Already, at least two terrorist organizations are
operating within these countries, seeking to establish Islamic
theocracy. Most importantly, these Central Asian nations are exactly
the kind of places that can become breeding grounds for terrorism.
Remember that almost all of the terrorists of 9/11 came not from
Muslim countries whose governments professed hatred of the United
States (Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan) but from Muslim countries whose
governments are friendly with the United States: Saudi Arabia and
Egypt. The same is true of these Central Asian states, where
west-friendly autocrats rule over Muslim populations, and where the
U.S. government has made alliances of necessity while pursuing the
larger goal of toppling the Taliban and Saddam Hussein.
As the people living under these regimes become more and more bitter
about the hopelessness of their lives, they are drawn to more radical
belief systems. The best way to combat the growth of such radicalism
is not to make society less free, as these Central Asian dictators
have done, but to make it more free. RFE/RL looks forward to
intensifying the fight to make Central Asia a freer, and therefore
safer, place.
***
I hope that I have succeeded today in getting my message across.
RFE/RL is not a Cold War relic, but a modern media organization
communicating to the world’s most unstable hotspots. Today we cannot
know what the next Afghanistan will be-just as we can’t know where
the next Srebrenica massacre will occur, or where the next militant
Islamic revolution will erupt. But the likelihood is that many people
there are listening to RFE/RL, and they are grateful that we have not
stopped fighting for our shared values: the free flow of information,
human rights, freedom and democracy.