BRUSSELS: The EU on Monday (Mar 17) warned that President Donald Trump’s freeze on US-funded media retailers, together with Radio Free Europe, risked “benefitting our frequent adversaries”.
Trump’s administration on the weekend began shedding workers at Voice of America and different broadcasters together with Prague-based Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFERL) after freezing their funding.
“We see these media retailers actually as beacons of fact, of democracy, and of hope for tens of millions of individuals all over the world,” stated European Fee spokeswoman Paula Pinho.
“Freedom of the press … is crucial for democracy. And this resolution dangers benefitting our frequent adversaries,” she stated, with out naming international locations, teams or people.
Pinho added that the freeze could be mentioned throughout a gathering of EU international ministers in Brussels on Monday.
Based by america in the course of the Chilly Battle to counter Soviet propaganda, RFE/RL was banned throughout the communist bloc together with former Czechoslovakia, the place regimes repeatedly jammed its sign.
The US-funded media have since centered on international locations like Russia, China and Iran.
Requested whether or not the European Union would “fill the void” left by america, Pinho stated it might not at all times be potential for the bloc to take action.
“We’re reiterating our assist,” she informed reporters, including: “We can not at all times step in for the US and for regardless of the US stops doing.”
Trump has already eviscerated the United States’ aid agency and its training division.
The media funding freeze impacts many different US retailers moreover Voice of America and RFERL, together with Radio Farda, a Persian-language broadcaster blocked by Iran’s authorities, and Alhurra, an Arabic-language community established after the Iraq invasion within the face of extremely crucial protection by Qatar-based Al-Jazeera.
Iran, China and Russia have all invested closely in state media retailers created to compete with Western narratives and to push out authorities strains to international audiences.
