July 14th, 2008 by Stephen

Last week, POMED posted a link to this article by Jason Leopold at the Public Record, criticizing programs funded by the State Department’s Iran Democracy Fund as lacking transparency and undermining true reform efforts in Iran.

Since then, we received the following email from the Broadcasting Board of Governors as a response to Leopold’s piece:

We offer a correction to Jason Leopold’s July 11 article, “State Department’s Iran Democracy Fund Shrouded in Secrecy.”

The piece reports that: “Congress has appropriated more than $120 million to fund the project. The State Department has spent most of the money on the U.S.-backed Radio Farda, Voice of America (VOA), Radio Free Europe, and to broadcast Persian programs into Iran via VOA satellite television.”

In fact, these broadcasts are funded through the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), the independent federal agency that oversees U.S. international broadcasting. While broadcasting to Iran was part of the Administration’s FY 2006 State Department supplemental request to support democracy in Iran, Congress appropriated $36.1 million directly to the BBG to enhance existing programming of the Voice of America and RFE/RL’s Radio Farda to Iran. The BBG is fully accountable to the Congress for the expenditure of these funds.

The article also states that: “The State Department has said it intends to spend $1.2 million of those funds to launch Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Azerbaijani in an effort to address the lack of objective and comprehensive news and information for Azerbaijanis, the largest ethnic minority group in Iran.” This is not correct. The BBG’s pending budget request with the Congress for FY 2009 asks for funding to begin programming to the large Azeri-speaking population of Iran.

Appreciate your help setting the record straight.

Sincerely,

Letitia King
Director
Office of Public Affairs
Broadcasting Board of Governors

Posted in Foreign Aid, Iran, US foreign policy |