Latest news with #HourHum
CBC
29-05-2025
- Business
- CBC
Radio Free Asia reporters sought safety in U.S. Now, they fear they're in danger
Social Sharing An ongoing U.S. retreat from defending liberal democracy has left some allies in danger of being exposed, stranded on a metaphorical battlefield. Under U.S. President Donald Trump's hard-nosed foreign policy, unapologetically based on profit, not principle, multiple democracy-promotion tools are being dismantled. This includes Radio Free Asia (RFA), which is being defunded. Created in the aftermath of China's 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre, it reports in nine Asian languages, using web sites, social media and short-wave radio to get news to audiences with limited access to uncensored media. With most of its U.S.-based staff laid off, some RFA employees who report from the safety of Washington. D.C., now risk losing not only their jobs but also their work visas and could face deportation to an uncertain future in their homelands. Hour Hum is one of them. He fled Cambodia in 2017 after some of his colleagues were arrested and RFA had to shutter its office. He went into hiding in Thailand. After seven years, he finally got a work visa and came to the U.S. with his wife. He likened it to reaching heaven after years in hell. Now, with a one-month-old to care for, he's clinging to his job as layoffs sweep across the newsroom. His wife is feeling anxious again as she did during those years in hiding, Hum said, fearing deportation. "If they don't kill me, they'll put me in jail," he said of his prospects in Cambodia, where reporters are routinely arrested and international organizations say independent journalism is increasingly impossible to do. "It's almost the same thing." Part of wider cuts The defunding of RFA comes amid a wave of similar cuts to foreign initiatives, including the complete abolition of the U.S. international-aid agency. The Trump administration sent a letter in March announcing that RFA's funding, $60 million US a year, was terminated. It was part of the same executive order that ended financial support for the main Canada think-tank in Washington and other U.S. government-funded news outlets, including Voice of America. Almost 90 per cent of U.S.-based RFA staff – nearly 400 people – have been laid off. Several dozen remain employed, as funding is still arriving in irregular spurts while the organization fights the cuts in court, arguing the president illegally undid funding already approved by Congress. Staff deemed most at-risk in their home countries are being kept on as long as possible while some money is still available. Some have opened asylum claims. 'It's what keeps me up at night' In her office, in a nearly empty bureau in Washington, RFA president Bay Fang recounted one anecdote after another of staff arrested over the years, along with some of their friends and relatives. In North Korea, a soldier was jailed in 2020 for just listening to RFA. "It's heartbreaking. It's what keeps me up at night," Fang said. "[They're] thrown in jail because of their reporting.… "Throughout it all, they wanted to keep going. They felt like it was their calling to actually let the world know what was happening in their country. The fact that now it could be the U.S. government silencing them is just heartbreaking." USAID workers carry belongings out of headquarters after massive program cuts 3 months ago Duration 0:53 USAID workers who lost their jobs were given 15-minute intervals to clear out their desks on Thursday amid a massive takedown of the widely successful program. Workers were greeted with cheers from supporters as they left the building for the final time. How RFA angered autocrats In the years since it was created in 1996, RFA's reporters have broken stories on camps in China for the Muslim Uyghur minority. They did early reporting on a strange new virus ripping through central China in 2020, getting tips from sources inside the country being arrested for speaking about COVID-19. They called up crematoriums in Wuhan and heard about staggering numbers of bodies and funeral homes publishing jobs ads seeking overnight staff. They broke stories about Chinese-controlled police stations within North America and intimidation of diaspora communities. In Myanmar, a villager found a phone with evidence of soldiers bragging about committing war crimes, with photos and evidence of throats being slit and decapitations. He got the phone to Radio Free Asia, which broke that story. So it's no surprise that reaction to the demise of RFA has been buoyant in some of those countries. In China, the government-affiliated Global Times called RFA and other U.S.-funded news operations a relic of Cold War ideological propaganda and welcomed its entry into the dustbin of history. "The so-called beacon of freedom," it wrote, referring specifically to Voice of America, "has now been discarded by its own government like a dirty rag." There was a celebratory Facebook post from Cambodia's longtime leader, Hun Sen, accused of rampant corruption and the killing and jailing of political opponents. He applauded Trump for leading the world in combating what Sun called the scourge of fake news. And as the U.S. pulls back on funding news, China and Russia are expanding their footprint, with state-run outlets like RT and CGTN opening dozens of stations and bureaus in Africa alone. A different world Such moves reflect a world where autocracies are spreading and the number of democracies has been shrinking for decades. And, indeed, one argument for scaling back funding for foreign state-funded news organizations such as RFA is that the world scarcely resembles the one in which it was founded. It was inspired by an earlier Cold War model: Radio Free Europe. Originally funded by the CIA, RFE broadcast in over a dozen Eastern European languages since the 1950s. There was overwhelming political support for RFA as it was built over the 1990s and entrenched into law in 1997 in a 401-21 vote in Congress. A year later, when China's government blocked RFA's reporters from covering a presidential trip there, Bill Clinton personally met with those reporters and granted them interviews. But the world and the U.S. position in it have changed. Back then, the internet barely counted as mass media. Today, there are more smartphones in the world than people, allowing myriad ways to communicate. The U.S. no longer has the same power to set the terms of the global conversation as it did when it had 10 times China's GDP, unrivalled military dominance and a balanced budget, as opposed to exploding debt today, and a less-dominant military. Part of wider cuts to government-funded media The Trump administration itself has said virtually nothing about its rationale for eliminating Radio Free Asia, specifically. It has justified gutting government-funded media in general, from the agency that oversees Radio Free Asia, Voice of America and Radio Free Europe to NPR and PBS. "He was elected in large part to reduce the federal bureaucracy, right?" State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce said when asked about the cuts to Radio Free Asia. "It's about waste and fraud, mismanagement. This is something that has to occur." Fang is emphatic, however: That even in a world with countless ways to communicate, there's still a role for an organizations like hers. She described a staffer working day and night, relentlessly calling sources in China to report on the Uyghur internment camps. "That was broken from here," she said. U.S.-based staff, working in Mandarin, also broke stories about COVID for which there was voracious appetite inside China, she said. Video views increased eightfold at the time, including clicks from Wuhan, Fang said. One Ipsos poll conducted for RFA in 2018 suggested as many as 44 million people a week may have accessed its content within China, about three per cent of its population. A Gallup survey commissioned by the service in 2023 found that almost three-quarters of Cambodians surveyed were aware of RFA, and 8.5 per cent saw its work on a weekly basis. "When we were created, it was with the understanding that having an educated citizenry in these different countries supporting democratic values would actually lead to awareness that is beneficial to U.S. interests," Fang said. Reporters share their stories A few remaining reporters were working on stories last week in the near-vacant newsroom in downtown Washington. One involved a bullet-train project in Vietnam — with a look at a sole-source contract and questions about oversight. Others touched on struggling tariff talks; a journalist arrested in Cambodia; and a Cambodian official telling Japan to avoid raising human rights during a political summit. A few days earlier, there was an unusual story about a Cambodian police officer charged with drunk-driving. The arrest came after RFA posted an extraordinary crash video that drew millions of views and attention to the case. "We made that big," said Poly Sam, director of the Cambodian service, himself a survivor of ghastly violence under the Khmer Rouge. During a work pause, the few remaining reporters discussed their own personal stories. Vuthy Tha is a single father of two young children, from Cambodia. He described threats from Cambodian officials, including from a cabinet minister and a spokesman for the governing party. "We know where you live," he recalled the spokesman telling him when he was in hiding in Thailand. Some time after, he saw someone standing outside filming his home. Asked what would happen to his kids if he's deported, Tha said he hopes co-workers might care for them. His colleague Hum just became a dad last month. In the weeks before the birth, Hum had been worrying he'd lose his job and with it, his health coverage. When the baby arrived March 26, and Hum still had his job, he took it as a sign and named the baby Lucky. Khoa Lai of the Vietnamese service said he arrived in the U.S. months ago, hopeful that, here, he could write without fear, unlike in his home country, where he still uses a pseudonym for some reporting.
Washington Post
06-04-2025
- Politics
- Washington Post
Foreign journalists at US-backed media fear being sent to repressive homelands after Trump's cuts
WASHINGTON — After hiding in Thailand for seven years, two Cambodian journalists arrived in the United States last year on work visas, aiming to keep providing people in their Southeast Asian homeland with objective, factual news through Radio Free Asia. But Vuthy Tha and Hour Hum now say their jobs and legal status in the U.S. are at risk after President Donald Trump recently signed an executive order gutting the government-run U.S. Agency for Global Media. The agency funds Radio Free Asia and other outlets tasked with delivering uncensored information to parts of the world under authoritarian rule and often without a free press of their own .
Yahoo
06-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Foreign journalists at US-backed media fear being sent to repressive homelands after Trump's cuts
WASHINGTON (AP) — After hiding in Thailand for seven years, two Cambodian journalists arrived in the United States last year on work visas, aiming to keep providing people in their Southeast Asian homeland with objective, factual news through Radio Free Asia. But Vuthy Tha and Hour Hum now say their jobs and legal status in the U.S. are at risk after President Donald Trump recently signed an executive order gutting the government-run U.S. Agency for Global Media. The agency funds Radio Free Asia and other outlets tasked with delivering uncensored information to parts of the world under authoritarian rule and often without a free press of their own. 'It fell out of sky,' Vuthy, a single father of two small children, said through a translator about the Trump administration's decision, which he says threatens to upend his life. 'I am very regretful that our listeners cannot receive the accurate news,' Hour said, also through a translator. Both men said they're worried about providing for their families and being allowed to stay in the U.S. They say it's impossible to return to Cambodia, a single-party state hostile to independent media where they fear being persecuted for their journalistic work. The administration has been dismantling or slashing the size of federal agencies, leading tens of thousands of government workers and contractors to be fired or put on leave. But the targeting of the U.S. Agency for Global Media, whose decades-old networks aim to extend American influence abroad, means journalists who have defied authoritarian regimes to help fulfill a U.S. mission of delivering pro-democracy programming could be deported and face harassment and persecution in their homelands. Eleven journalists associated with the U.S.-funded media outlets are behind bars overseas, including RFA's Shin Daewe, who is serving 15 years in Myanmar on a charge of supporting terrorism. At least 84 U.S. Agency for Global Media, or USAGM, journalists in the United States on work visas could face deportation, including at least 23 'at serious risk of being immediately arrested upon arrival and potentially imprisoned," according to the advocacy group Reporters Without Borders and a coalition of 36 human rights organizations. 'It is outrageous that these journalists, who risk their lives to expose the extent of repression in their home countries, might be completely abandoned," said Thibaut Bruttin, director general of Reporters Without Borders. 'The U.S. Congress must take responsibility for protecting these reporters and all USAGM-funded outlets, funded by Congress itself,' Bruttin said. 'This responsibility is not just moral — it stems from the United States' commitment to defending the principles of democracy and press freedom.' The Senate Foreign Relations Committee and the House Foreign Affairs Committee did not respond to requests for comment. The White House did not comment. The State Department said it is coordinating with USAGM on imprisoned journalists and that it condemns unjust detentions of journalists for exercising their freedom of expression. Journalists sue over Trump's order A number of journalists for Voice of America, a news service also overseen by USAGM, have sued in a federal court. That includes two unnamed foreign journalists on temporary visas. If deported, one could risk imprisonment for 10 years for his work for VOA, and the other, a member of a persecuted minority in his home country, could be in 'physical danger," the lawsuit said. The court has temporarily halted contract terminations, preventing the visa holders from being forced to leave for now. Both RFA and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, another USAGM-funded media outlet, also have sued seeking restoration of funding. Trump's cuts come after the U.S. last year helped free Alsu Kurmasheva — a dual U.S.-Russian citizen and journalist with RFE/RL — in a high-profile prisoner swap that included Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich. In February, the Trump administration announced the release of Andrey Kuznechyk, a Belarusian journalist with RFE/RL's Belarus service. The network still has four journalists jailed — one each in Azerbaijan, Belarus, Russia and Russia-occupied Crimea. Voice of America has a contributor jailed in Myanmar and another in Vietnam, said Jessica Jerreat, VOA's press freedom editor. In Vietnam, four RFA reporters are in jail and another is under house arrest, according to Tamara Bralo, the outlet's head of journalist security. She said she's concerned that American support in seeking their release could diminish if RFA folds. Vietnam consistently ranks near the bottom in the Press Freedom Index by Reporters Without Borders, which says about 40 journalists are held in Vietnam's prisons where mistreatment is widespread. Reporters fear being sent back Khoa Lai, a Vietnamese journalist who joined RFA in Washington on a work visa only days before Trump took office, said returning to Vietnam is risky for him. 'I could face prosecution or be in prison,' said Lai, who produces video stories on freedom of speech, freedom of religion and political corruption for RFA's Vietnamese service. 'I don't know for sure, but it won't be good." Both Vuthy and Hour began working for RFA in Cambodia but had to leave in 2017 when Cambodia's top court dissolved the main opposition CNRP party, authorities arrested their colleagues and RFA closed its office. In neighboring Thailand as refugees, both continued to report for RFA, but with their identities hidden. They still risked getting sent back to Cambodia until RFA brought them to the U.S. on work visas last year. They have reported on issues ranging from politics, corruption and human rights to climate change and environment. Cambodia's autocratic former Prime Minister Hun Sen, who ruled his country for nearly four decades and passed power to his son Hun Manet, praised Trump in a Facebook post for 'having the courage to lead the world to combat fake news' by cutting funding to USAGM. Vuthy says he's still hopeful that RFA might survive, adding that it 'is fighting for its existence." ___ Associated Press writers Kanis Leung in Hong Kong, Sopheng Cheang in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, and Elsie Chen in Washington contributed to this report.
Associated Press
06-04-2025
- Politics
- Associated Press
Foreign journalists at US-backed media fear being sent to repressive homelands after Trump's cuts
WASHINGTON (AP) — After hiding in Thailand for seven years, two Cambodian journalists arrived in the United States last year on work visas, aiming to keep providing people in their Southeast Asian homeland with objective, factual news through Radio Free Asia. But Vuthy Tha and Hour Hum now say their jobs and legal status in the U.S. are at risk after President Donald Trump recently signed an executive order gutting the government-run U.S. Agency for Global Media. The agency funds Radio Free Asia and other outlets tasked with delivering uncensored information to parts of the world under authoritarian rule and often without a free press of their own. 'It fell out of sky,' Vuthy, a single father of two small children, said through a translator about the Trump administration's decision, which he says threatens to upend his life. 'I am very regretful that our listeners cannot receive the accurate news,' Hour said, also through a translator. Both men said they're worried about providing for their families and being allowed to stay in the U.S. They say it's impossible to return to Cambodia, a single-party state hostile to independent media where they fear being persecuted for their journalistic work. The administration has been dismantling or slashing the size of federal agencies, leading tens of thousands of government workers and contractors to be fired or put on leave. But the targeting of the U.S. Agency for Global Media, whose decades-old networks aim to extend American influence abroad, means journalists who have defied authoritarian regimes to help fulfill a U.S. mission of delivering pro-democracy programming could be deported and face harassment and persecution in their homelands. Eleven journalists associated with the U.S.-funded media outlets are behind bars overseas, including RFA's Shin Daewe, who is serving 15 years in Myanmar on a charge of supporting terrorism. At least 84 U.S. Agency for Global Media, or USAGM, journalists in the United States on work visas could face deportation, including at least 23 'at serious risk of being immediately arrested upon arrival and potentially imprisoned,' according to the advocacy group Reporters Without Borders and a coalition of 36 human rights organizations. 'It is outrageous that these journalists, who risk their lives to expose the extent of repression in their home countries, might be completely abandoned,' said Thibaut Bruttin, director general of Reporters Without Borders. 'The U.S. Congress must take responsibility for protecting these reporters and all USAGM-funded outlets, funded by Congress itself,' Bruttin said. 'This responsibility is not just moral — it stems from the United States' commitment to defending the principles of democracy and press freedom.' The Senate Foreign Relations Committee and the House Foreign Affairs Committee did not respond to requests for comment. The White House did not comment. The State Department said it is coordinating with USAGM on imprisoned journalists and that it condemns unjust detentions of journalists for exercising their freedom of expression. Journalists sue over Trump's order A number of journalists for Voice of America, a news service also overseen by USAGM, have sued in a federal court. That includes two unnamed foreign journalists on temporary visas. If deported, one could risk imprisonment for 10 years for his work for VOA, and the other, a member of a persecuted minority in his home country, could be in 'physical danger,' the lawsuit said. The court has temporarily halted contract terminations, preventing the visa holders from being forced to leave for now. Both RFA and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, another USAGM-funded media outlet, also have sued seeking restoration of funding. Trump's cuts come after the U.S. last year helped free Alsu Kurmasheva — a dual U.S.-Russian citizen and journalist with RFE/RL — in a high-profile prisoner swap that included Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich. In February, the Trump administration announced the release of Andrey Kuznechyk, a Belarusian journalist with RFE/RL's Belarus service. The network still has four journalists jailed — one each in Azerbaijan, Belarus, Russia and Russia-occupied Crimea. Voice of America has a contributor jailed in Myanmar and another in Vietnam, said Jessica Jerreat, VOA's press freedom editor. In Vietnam, four RFA reporters are in jail and another is under house arrest, according to Tamara Bralo, the outlet's head of journalist security. She said she's concerned that American support in seeking their release could diminish if RFA folds. Vietnam consistently ranks near the bottom in the Press Freedom Index by Reporters Without Borders, which says about 40 journalists are held in Vietnam's prisons where mistreatment is widespread. Reporters fear being sent back Khoa Lai, a Vietnamese journalist who joined RFA in Washington on a work visa only days before Trump took office, said returning to Vietnam is risky for him. 'I could face prosecution or be in prison,' said Lai, who produces video stories on freedom of speech, freedom of religion and political corruption for RFA's Vietnamese service. 'I don't know for sure, but it won't be good.' Both Vuthy and Hour began working for RFA in Cambodia but had to leave in 2017 when Cambodia's top court dissolved the main opposition CNRP party, authorities arrested their colleagues and RFA closed its office. In neighboring Thailand as refugees, both continued to report for RFA, but with their identities hidden. They still risked getting sent back to Cambodia until RFA brought them to the U.S. on work visas last year. They have reported on issues ranging from politics, corruption and human rights to climate change and environment. Cambodia's autocratic former Prime Minister Hun Sen, who ruled his country for nearly four decades and passed power to his son Hun Manet, praised Trump in a Facebook post for 'having the courage to lead the world to combat fake news' by cutting funding to USAGM. Vuthy says he's still hopeful that RFA might survive, adding that it 'is fighting for its existence.'
