(Source: Malay Mail Online via R. Lewis )
BANGKOK, March 8 — The BBC World Service has stopped broadcasting from one of its major global transmission stations situated in Thailand, AFP has learned, after talks broke down with a junta riled by its uncensored coverage.
Sources with knowledge of the negotiations said the BBC’s Thai-language output impeded discussions about renewing the 20-year lease on the complex, the network’s main shortwave broadcast station for Asia.
The centre’s large red and white transmission towers in Nakhon Sawan 240km north of Bangkok beamed local language news into tightly-controlled countries such as China and North Korea, and into places where many still rely on radio like Pakistan and Afghanistan.
– See more at: http://www.themalaymailonline.com/world/article/bbcs-thai-transmission-towers-fall-silent-as-junta-talks-falter#sthash.NsUkQnEQ.dpuf
It’s always sad to lose a powerful transmission site, but the nice thing about shortwave is they can continue to serve those countries from friendlier climates, like Singapore, the UAE, Oman, Tajikistan, Meyerton and Armenia. All of them seem to direct at least some programming to the same areas as the Thai site. And I think the Tajik site has been ramping up since the start of the new year to provide more BBC broadcasts, perhaps in anticipation of this very issue.
First IBB Sri Lanka then BBC Thailand… I spent a very happy year working on the antenna construction and commissioning at this site. We were working up to the deadline and working two shifts a day so that we could avoid interference from the adjacent MF site which was swamping all of our test gear when making measurements. The last antenna was commissioned on Christmas day, a week before the Hong Kong handover. This was a wonderful site to work on, well engineered and a terrific team.