Tag Archives: Shortwave Radio

Shortwave Radio Recordings: NHK Radio Japan

Tokyo, Japan (Source: Wikimedia Commons)

For you listening pleasure: thirty minutes of NHK Radio Japan’s English language service.

This broadcast was recorded an hour ago, at 10:00 UTC on 9,625 (April 19, 2013). Though NHK has dropped their English language services into North America, you can still receive their broadcasts targeting other regions quite easily.

Click here to download the full recording, or simply listen via the embedded player below. note that I include a full five minutes of their interval signal:

Enjoy!

Heritage Foundation: BBG isn’t listening

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(Source: Heritage Foundation)

U.S. international broadcasting strategy again landed under congressional scrutiny in Wednesday’s House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing.

Representative Brad Sherman (D–CA) wanted to know why the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) ignored the congressional mandate to keep broadcasting to Pakistan in several local languages. In spite of a specific $1.5 million appropriation for broadcasting to Pakistan, everything has been cut except programming in Urdu. “You would not dream of broadcasting to Los Angeles in only one language,” said Sherman.

While Secretary of State John Kerry did not offer an explanation, the problems at the BBG cry out for a solution. The agency leadership time and time again has angered and frustrated Congress by ignoring its mandates to keep radio broadcasting lines open to areas of the world where free and dependable media do not exist. Instead, the broadcasting governors and the BBG bureaucracy are grappling with their own agenda and the impact of technological advances, with the result that the core mission gets short shrift.

In the President’s fiscal year 2014 budget request, the BBG accounts for $731 million, a not insignificant amount of funding. Yet at the same time, deep cuts in language services positions and broadcasting hours are proposed in the budget following already announced cuts resulting from sequestration.

[…]There is no doubt, though, that the BBG structure itself stands in dire need of overhaul. The nine-member, part-time board (on which the Secretary of State or his designate sits) is a poor mechanism for executive oversight of a complex broadcasting system, and board member terms are routinely allowed to expire without timely replacement. The most recent board meeting on April 12 was attended by just two board members.

A composite map of the world at night produced by NASA shows the vast areas of the globe—mainly Asia and sub-Saharan Africa—where there is no power grid to light up cities at night. Many of those areas, where reliance on Internet or television is impossible, are precisely the beneficiaries of U.S. international broadcasting. Let us not lose sight of that fact.

Read the full article on the Heritage Foundation website.

For those of you not familiar, note that the The Heritage Foundation is a US conservative think tank based in Washington, D.C. whose mission is to “formulate and promote conservative public policies based on the principles of free enterprise, limited government, individual freedom, traditional American values, and a strong national defense.”

Thanks, Ted, for the tip!

Shortwave Radio Recordings: Radio New Zealand International

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The New Zealand Bellbird (Anthornis melanura) provides the interval signal for RNZI (Photo: Wikimedia Commons)

One of my favorite shortwave radio broadcasters is Radio New Zealand International. RNZI has authoritative news–with a focus on NZ and the Pacific islands–music, sports and their own unique character, though they operate on a very modest budget by international broadcasting standards.

The RNZI interval signal is charming and unmistakable: the call of the New Zealand Bellbird.

Fortunately, in the 3 hour recording of RNZI below, I caught not only the interval signal as the broadcast began, but also as it went off the air. This recording was made on March 14th 2013 starting around 8:00 UTC on 9,765 kHz. (You’ll note news of the Pope.)

Click here to download the full broadcast as an MP3, or simply listen via the embedded player below:

Note to SWLing Post reader, Mike:
I hope you enjoy these sounds from home!

BBC World Service program discusses Chinese jamming

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In the latest episode of Over To You, host Rajan Datar discusses how the BBC World Service’s shortwave transmissions are being affected by jamming in parts of Asia. It’s a short but informative episode.

Even Datar and his guest, Nigel Fry (Head of Distribution for BBC Global News), could appreciate the irony that while China is investing a substantial number of resources in jamming BBC WS English broadcasts, the BBC World Service is voluntarily trimming their English offerings anyway. What a gift to those in China trying to control access to the global press!

Thanks to the Southgate ARC for the tip.

(Source: Over To You)

Over To You explores the way that the World Service’s shortwave transmissions are being affected by jamming in parts of Asia, following up from an email from a listener in West Bengal who was having problems listening to the service. With the help of the World Service’s head of business development, we find out how jamming of the World Service shortwave transmissions inside China is spilling over into neighbouring countries, and explore what the BBC can do to redress the situation through international organisations.

Click here to listen to the full interview.

SW Radio Africa: Police targeting children in radio raids

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(Source: SW Radio Africa)

By Nomalanga Moyo
14 March 2013

The illegal seizure of wind-up radios reached new levels this week with reports that the police are now using primary school pupils to source information about the receivers.

Villagers in Lupane revealed that the police have been visiting schools and asking little children in Grade 0 and Grade 1(aged between 4 and 6 years) whether their parents own or listen to any radios.

This follows reports that suspected state security agents on Tuesday raided several homesteads at Mpofu village in the Gwampa area and confiscated the wind-up radios.

Speaking to SW Radio Africa one villager who asked not to be named for fear of reprisals, said the police have been going to schools, writing down names, and then visiting those suspected of owning the radios by night.

She said although the agents will be wearing civilian clothes, the villagers know it is the police since they have been announcing their ban on radios.

Our source said she suspects the police are aware of the popularity of shortwave radios in the area, hence they are now confiscating them.

“The police have been announcing that villagers should not be in possession of these radios. Their reason is that we listen to news broadcasts from outside the country which criticise ZANU PF.

“Such harassment by the state security agents normally escalates during election time, which indicates that we are not free to exercise our individual choices if we can’t even listen to different views offered by these shortwave radio stations,” she added.

On Tuesday an MDC official from Mpofu Village, Cosmas Phiri, told the NewsDay newspaper that MDC members were raided shortly before midnight on Monday.

Phiri, who was with some of the affected villagers, told NewsDay that a group of state security agents confiscated at least 10 radios from more than 10 people.

The night raids have stirred up fear within the community, following threats that those who refused to surrender their radio receivers will be abducted and “made to disappear” invoking memories of Gukurahundi.

Since the announcement of the constitutional referendum date on February 15^th, Zimbabwean police have embarked on a nationwide campaign targeting civic society organisations and individuals.

On February 19^th the police announced a ban on ‘specially designed’ radios, which they argued will be used to promote hate speech ahead of the polls.

Following the ban several organisations have been raided, including community radio initiative Radio Dialogue where police seized more than 180 wind-up radio sets and arrested its managing editor.

Last month, officers ransacked the offices of poll observers ZESN as well as those of violence monitoring group the Zimbabwe Peace Project (ZPP), in search of the so-called “illegal” radios.

The police have since arrested ZPP head Jestina Mukoko and charged her with, among other things, illegally importing short wave radios.

Thanks, Rich, for passing this news along. Read the full article and follow news on the radio ban at SW Radio Africa.

Reader Chris shares travel recordings: Voice of Mongolia, Korea

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Map pointing to Truk Lagoon (Source: truk-lagoon.com)

SWLing Post reader, Chris Johnson, recently sent me a message confessing his love of travel combined with shortwave radio listening. When he told me about his enviable plans to travel to the tiny islands of Truk Lagoon in the Federated States of Micronesia–and to record some of the broadcasts he heard–I asked if he would allow me to share his recordings on the Post. Fortunately for us, he agreed!

Below are two of his recordings, the first from the Voice of Mongolia, the second from the Voice of Korea. Both happen to be very difficult stations to catch here in eastern North America. His comments follow each recording:

Voice of Mongolia Shortwave Broadcast to Asia and Europe. Using a Sony ICF-SW7600G with a whip antenna. Recorded on 29 January 2013 at 1030z on 12085 khz from the Blue Lagoon Resort, Truk Lagoon, Federated States of Micronesia. The broadcast interval signal begins at 1:35

Voice of Korea; Recorded on a Sony ICF-SW7600G using a whip antenna. 7 February 2013 on 15100 khz at 0500z Location; Puka Beach, Boracay Island, Philippines. The program was scheduled for 60 minutes but due to the frequent power outages in the DPRK, the program ceased at approximately 52 minutes.

Thanks, Chris!

Media Institute of Southern Africa reacts to Zimbabwe shortwave receiver ban

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The shortwave version of the Eton Microlink FR160 is one of the noted "

The shortwave Eton Microlink FR160 is one of the noted “specially-designed radios” capable of receiving international broadcasts (like those from the Voice of America) which might compete with state-owned stations.

International broadcasters (and those cutting their budgets) should ask themselves the following question:

If shortwave radio is no longer relevant in today’s high-tech world, why are these radios suddenly being banned in a country controlled by a repressive regime?

The government of Zimbabwe apparently fears the little self-powered shortwave radio you see on the right. —>

Read the Media Institute of Southern Africa’s reaction to the radio ban in the Huffington Post:

(Source: Huffington Post)

Media freedom campaigners said Friday police in Zimbabwe are breaking the law by seizing and banning small radio receivers that can tune in to stations not linked to the state broadcasting monopoly controlled by President Robert Mugabe’s party.

The Media Institute of Southern Africa said Friday no regulations outlaw the hand-cranked, solar powered radios that democracy and election support groups plan to use ahead of a referendum on a new constitution next month and crucial elections later in the year. Police insist the radios and cheap Chinese 3G smartphones with GPS capability are being supplied by “subversive organizations” and pose a security threat surrounding the polling.

[…]”The importance of a radio set cannot be overemphasized as it is a generally affordable legal gadget used for receiving information by the public,” the group said.

Police efforts to “criminalize the distribution and possession of the radio sets” infringed citizens constitutional rights to freedom of expression and basic civil liberties,” it said.

Such radios and other equipment were seized in recent police raids on the Zimbabwe Peace Project, a human rights group that monitors political violence, and the independent Zimbabwe Election Support Network.

Police allege those and other groups were planning to mobilize “recruits” with unauthorized communications devices in rural districts across the country, traditionally voting strongholds of Mugabe’s party.

The Elton [Eton, actually] Microlink radio, at a cost of about $30, has channels able to receive Voice of America broadcasts beamed in from neighboring Botswana and shortwave broadcasts on Zimbabwe from Europe.

The state Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corp. has four radio stations fiercely loyal to Mugabe. State and independent newspapers are not commonly found in impoverished rural districts where communities rely for information on radios only receiving state radio and powered by batteries that are often in short supply.

Police warned this week that the activities of some Western-backed non-governmental organizations and rights groups now verged on espionage. People found in remote areas with the cited devices could face arrest.

They said the “specially designed radios are not compatible with state-owned radio stations” and could inflame election tensions by promoting hate speech.[…]

Read the full article here…