"Georgian authorities have blocked most access to Russian news broadcasters and websites since the outbreak of the conflict with Moscow. Georgia's Interior Ministry said the action was not anti-democratic, but Russian broadcasts could not be allowed to 'scare our population'. ... Georgian media, private and state-owned, are generally under the sway of President Mikheil Saakashvili, who promotes his country as a Western-style democracy. However, the country's main opposition television station was shut by the Interior Ministry at gunpoint in November and some of its equipment was smashed up." PC Magazine, 19 August 2008.
"Within hours after fighting erupted, Russian hackers had established a site, StopGeorgia.ru, that showed a list of Georgian Web sites targeted and which sites had been brought down, and allowed visitors to download a simple program to enable their own computers to join the attack." UPI, 19 August 2008.
"NATO calls it iWar... 'It's very easy to cause a lot of trouble using three guys and a laptop.'" Canadian Press, 19 August 2008.
"What frustrates computer-security experts is that the features that make the Internet such an invaluable resource -- its openness and interconnectedness -- also make it easier for hackers to do harm. As a staple of 21st-century warfare, cyberattacks will become increasingly sophisticated, forcing governments and private industry to build ever-stronger firewalls and other defenses, experts said." CNN, 18 August 2008.
"Internet access, in one form or another, is being driven into developing nations at an astonishing rate, thanks to a combination of philanthropy and profit-making. ... PC manufacturers, meanwhile, already rely on developing markets in China, Russia, India, and Brazil to drive both growth and profits. Any effective security policy will have to take such growth into account, and plan accordingly. At present, technological dominance and superior infrastructure may give the United States a decisive edge, but history teaches that this edge will inevitably degrade as other countries either catch up or as the threats themselves evolve." Joel Hruska, ars technica, 18 August 2008.
"From a domestic perspective, the most frightening thing about this whole Georgian cyber-attack situation isn't that we're vulnerable to a similar onslaught of legions of cyber-warriors, government-sponsored or not, it's that Washington doesn't really know what it's doing." Cyrus Farivar, Salon Machinist blog, 18 August 2008. Posted: 20 Aug 2008
Voice of Russia expands broadcasts "for Georgia." "Voice of Russia radio station will increase its broadcasting from Moscow for Georgia by using additional transmitters and increasing airtime. 'Voice of Russia will increase its broadcasting for Georgia by increasing the number of short- and medium-wave transmitters. The broadcasting facilities of the seven transmission units in Moscow, St. Petersburg, Krasnodar and Samara have now been connected,' the Voice of Russia said in a press statement. Moreover, Voice of Russia's Russian programs will be re- broadcast in the Abkhaz capital on the FM frequency at 107.9 MHz. ... On August 9, a decree by Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili and the decision by Georgia's National Security Council banned all Russian television and radio channels and barred access to the Russian part of the Internet. Voice of Russia stopped its broadcasting from Tbilisi for Georgia from the early hours of August 8. The radio station started broadcasting for Georgia from Moscow." Interfax, 17 August 2008. See also website of Voice of Russia, successor to Radio Moscow. Sergei tells me these VOR broadcasts are not in Georgian, but Russian: "Most educated Georgians speak fluent Russian so it's not the problem. The poor quality of those programs is another issue." Posted: 20 Aug 2008
RFE/RL interviews France 24 re Georgia. "RFE/RL correspondent Charles Recknagel speaks with Robert Parsons, international affairs editor at France 24 and former head of RFE/RL's Georgian Service, who is in Georgia." Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 17 August 2008. See also RFE/RL News, 18 August 2008. Posted: 19 Aug 2008
Former BBCWS MD, and I, remember the 1968 invasion of Czechoslovakia. "The radio came on a minute or two before 8am on the morning of August 21, 1968. It always did. That was the start of family routine in our north London home. This morning, however, was shocking and unforgettable. The BBC bulletin led on the news that 165,000 Warsaw Pact forces had invaded Czechoslovakia from all points of the compass. ... I was born in Czechoslovakia in 1936, moving to England with my family when I was three. My first thought that morning was for my relatives, living mainly in Moravia. Ann and I, newly married, had visited them in 1961. We had experienced the dragooning of small-town life, the public loudspeakers barking out instructions to the farmers." John Tusa (managing director of BBC World Service 1986 to 1993), The Telegraph, 19 August 2008.
Even before the Prague Spring, Radio Prague's English service had a relaxed tone, refreshing for stations from communist eastern Europe. One could sense that Czechoslovakia was the Warsaw Pact country most likely to reform. During the Prague Spring, Radio Prague was one of the best international radio stations on the air.
It may have been the evening of August 20, U.S. time, that U.S. newscasts were reporting the invasion. As a teenager in northern Indiana, I tuned to Radio Prague's English broadcast at 0100 GMT on its 7345 kHz frequency. Instead of the usual "Forward Left" interval signal before the transmission, I heard stern march music. Then a routine broadcast of Radio Prague, making no mention of the invasion. It must have been recorded before the invasion began.
The next night, Radio Prague did not appear. It did return weeks later, with the Radio Prague staff thanking listeners for their messages of support, and stating that the Soviet troops were not invited. After a few more days, the familiar voices disappeared from Radio Prague's English service, and the station took on a very pro-Soviet line.
Meanwhile, the North American Service of Radio Moscow, having heard many references to Soviet invasion forces from Western news sources, started referring to U.S. troops in South Vietnam as U.S. invasion forces.
"It was just at this time, literally days after the invasion, that a 24-year-old Englishwoman started working here at Radio Prague. Her name was Liz Skelton, and a few weeks ago I had the opportunity to record an interview with her as she revisited the building where she had worked 40 years before." David Vaughan, Radio Prague, 17 Augut 2008. Posted: 19 Aug 2008
No comments:
Post a Comment