Radio Free Europe, Czech Republic
Jan 8 2005

RFE/RL Caucasus Services Launch New Regional Discussion Program

(Washington/Prague–January 7, 2005) The Armenian, Azerbaijani and
Georgian broadcast services of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
(RFE/RL) are launching a new jointly produced, regional program
designed to help bridge the divisions that exist among the several
nations living in the South Caucasus.

The 20-minute program will be heard as part of RFE/RL’s regular
programming every Saturday at 6:00PM (local time) on Georgian State
Radio and at 5:15PM and 11:15PM (local time) on Azerbaijan’s
Teleradio network, and on Sunday evenings at 7:00PM on Armenian State
Radio. The broadcasts will be available on RFE/RL’s local private
affiliates as well as on the Internet and via shortwave and
direct-to-home satellite broadcast (see for more
schedule information).

Every other week, the program will be made up of a live roundtable,
moderated from Prague, but conducted either from RFE/RL’s studios in
Tbilisi, Georgia or via phone with guests located in each of the
three capitals — Tbilisi, Yerevan, Armenia and Baku, Azerbaijan.
Programs for those weeks when a roundtable will not be broadcast
(including the first broadcast January 8) will be prerecorded by
local journalists in Tbilisi, Yerevan and Baku and packaged by RFE/RL
editors in Prague. Editorial control of the program will remain with
RFE/RL.

According to RFE/RL Associate Director of Broadcasting Nenad Pejic,
the topics addressed on the program will “concentrate on the future
and on issues that citizens in the region share as common problems,”
in an effort to counteract the general practice in the Caucasus of
using mass media to perpetuate negative images of adversaries and to
promote one-dimensional views of the various conflicts that divide
the residents of all three countries. “Our aim is to engage
communities in a dialogue that will show how much they share rather
than repeat how much divides them,” Pejic said. As a result, while
not shying away from sensitive political issues such as the region’s
foreign policy orientation, upcoming programs will address such
issues of broad concern in all three countries as health care reform,
education reform, energy and pipeline policy, and transport and
communications issues.

The new program is being produced in cooperation with the
Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the
German Gesellschaft fuer Technische Zusammenarbeit GmbH (GTZ, German
Technical Cooperation).

RFE/RL’s Armenian, Azerbaijani and Georgian Services broadcast a
combined 12 hours of programming a day to the South Caucasus,
produced in Prague and in local bureaus in Yerevan, Baku and Tbilisi
and transmitted to listeners via satellite, shortwave and AM, FM, UKV
and cable signals provided by local affiliate stations. Programming
aired by all three services is also available via the Internet, at
and at the respective service websites:
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