(00:00:00) Long before there was CNN. There was the BBC since the 1920s. The British Broadcasting Corporation has been broadcasting news to Britain since 1932. It's been broadcasting news to the world. Currently. The BBC World Service has an audience estimated at a at least 125 million listeners. It broadcasts in 39 languages. BBC is clearly one of the most influential media voices in the world. And today we are going to spend some time looking at the role of international news the role of foreign correspondence specifically the role of the BBC our guests. As I said is Bob job ins who spent some 20 years as a foreign correspondent primarily in the Middle East since 1989. Mr. Jabez has been the editor of the BBC's World Service news. He is the man primarily responsible for all of the BBC News you here on Minnesota Public Radio each day like to thank you for coming by man's job and surgery. She's pleasure. Well, we're getting the questioners lined up, mr. Job--and, so Can you give us a brief overview of the BBC structure you both got a domestic service and a foreign service has a (00:01:08) it's pretty complicated. I think fun and correspondence. It's easy to understand another country than it is to understand the BBC. We have to domestic TV channels. We have five domestic radio channels. We have 40 something local radio stations. That's all within Britain. Then World service has a 24-hour Radio Service in English a 24-hour TV service in English. And we broadcasting 39 other languages sometimes for up to 14 or 15 hours a day. So Arabic or Russian, so they are in effect autonomous radio stations (00:01:41) BBC financed by the government or how does a how does that were an arm of the government? (00:01:47) Certainly not over the government least the government would deny that very strongly we are partly the world service is is publicly-funded were paid for by the tax man by the taxpayer. Text person but our television operation funnily enough is a commercially funded operation Our World Service television. We ask the government for money for that and they said no, thanks and so in the end thinking it was still a good idea. We went ahead with it and we funded it in a number of commercial Partnerships. So we're in a very curious position now domestically all of the domestic services are paid for by a device called the license fee, which is a sort of poll tax. Anybody who owns a television receiver is obliged to pay something like a hundred and twenty five dollars a year for the privilege of watching television. (00:02:39) Now there is in this country. I think General disinterest in foreign News international news unless we're involved the United States is involved in some major crisis somewhere people tend not to pay a lot of attention to international news. Is that true in Britain around the world as well. (00:02:58) I think that it's difficult to tell just how interested people really are because often it's what's available. I think that in most countries there is a proportion of the population which is deeply interested in foreign news with what difference is there is the availability of that news and in some cities in the United States, you're uniquely privileged. You have a good national public radio network of one form of the other and you have access to international news through that system. There are other places where that doesn't exist. I think in Britain we have we delude ourselves that we are more interested. I don't think that's true. We had some research recently would suggest that people watch television for the first few minutes for the new show and they switch off or they do something else and I think that's always a risk. The World Service I think is very privileged because we have an audience which is self-selecting. It's an audience which says we are switching on World Service radio or television because we want to or we need to know what's happening and many of our audience live in countries where the media is controlled by the government where it is censored by the government where it's limited in some form and people who want to know what's happening to have to turn to an external broadcaster such as the BBC (00:04:16) did they make an effort those governments to jam the signal of the BBC? (00:04:21) It's happened on and off the last big occasion where we had a problem with jamming was during the Gulf War when the Iraqi has jammed the BBC signal in Arabic to the Gulf region, not successfully. It must be said jamming is very very expensive and one of the ironies of the post-cold war period is that we are now hiring or renting from the Russians large transmitters, which they used to use to do they used Used to jam us. What's interesting about World Service radio and television is that the radio service can circumvent government opposition more easily. It's very hard to stop a shortwave radio signal with TV. It's much easier and it's interesting that in our big Target area, which is the Far East a number of governments have restrictions on the ownership of satellite dishes and you may have read that recently. The Chinese have just imposed that restriction what's equally interesting is that the members of the public find ways around that bend and in India, for example where television is very tightly regulated almost every small village has its local No one's calling capitalist. I suppose who's built himself a dish stuck it up and has cabled the village and people are able to watch satellite TV. It's very powerful impact are going to a small village and find people watching the BBC World Service. Television news (00:05:52) Our Guest today is Bob job and who is editor of the BBC's were all Service news. We're broadcasting live from the Kauffman Memorial unions theater lecture hall and the campus of the University of Minnesota. And those of you here in our theater feel free to come up and ask mr. Job in this whatever questions you have. We've got a caller on the line with the question. Hi, you're on Minnesota Public Radio. Yes. I'd like to know what is how do you explain that the United States media refers to the people and Haiti and Somalia as thugs mops Warlords, but when you talk about Bosnia you talk about leaders. (00:06:33) Well, that's an interesting question. I think one of the problems we face at World Service BBC World Service is exactly that that problem of terminology and we're very aware of how even with the best of intentions it's sometimes possible to slip into that very loaded kind of reporting where you have Somali leaders are called Warlords. And as you say and in Yugoslavia, they're called leaders of factions or something. It can be worse than that. You can find also that if there's a any kind of massacre in Somalia, it's people being hacked and chopped and all the rest of his happening in Europe it somehow described in a slightly more in inverted commas. I would say more tasteful way. I think you have to be very alert to that because if you're not careful the way you use words expresses a judgment about how you feel about the eventual trying to report and if World service has built its reputation on its news Activity The Thing I think most of our reputation to is our reputation for fairness for trying to be objective for trying to give more than one side of a conflict and for trying to understand what it is that makes people act the way they do and certainly I don't think we succeed a hundred percent but I think that we succeed perhaps more often than some of our competitors Us Media. I'm not sure what your problem is. I think it's perfectly because it certainly uncertain TV shows and in some newspapers the line between news reporting and entertainment has become blurred and it's easier to do it if you have heroes and villains than if you try to understand that even villains often are right. (00:08:16) Do a BBC foreign correspondents have to go undergo some special training before they're assigned to a given country. (00:08:23) Well it varies we have a BBC foreign correspondent here John line from the United Nations. Maybe we can ask him in a minute. But the only truth is yes sometimes other occasions not when I went to Egypt. I was posted there as a foreign correspondent for the BBC and I spent about three months before I went training myself trying to get the historical and political background straight in my mind. Nothing that I read or learn before. I went prepared me for the reality and a lot of the learning I think bye-bye has to by definition take place on the job. (00:08:57) Do most of the correspondents are they able to speak the language of the country? And if not, how do they how do they know what their how do they know what they're getting is actually (00:09:06) truthful. Well John speaks American he's hopefully certainly we would expect correspondence in most places to have some understanding of the the local language. I mean, there are some places It is absolutely critical that they do in China. That's an obvious place. We expect our correspondent there to speak Chinese in Moscow. We expect our correspondence to speak Russian in the Middle East. We expect them to be able to get by in Arabic and so on you can't expect every single correspondent in every single City to be a brilliant linguist and there will always be people who can't do that. But I do think you're right. It weakens their skill as a journalist not to be able to talk to Ordinary People. If you're not careful, you'll end up spending your life talking to officials to Diplomat to academics to lawyers to doctors people who speak English their view of the world is not the same view as that of well, I was going to say taxi drivers, but I mean just ordinary people in the Stream (00:10:01) Bob job ins is our guest today on midday, and we have some folks lined up here at the Kauffman Memorial Union theater microphone. We have questions from his job and go ahead sir. I'd like to pursue the matter of weakness of American broadcast. (00:10:16) Is just a little (00:10:16) further if I may I visited a number of foreign countries and I've been struck by the fact that the BBC Radio is said to be by a lot of people their preferred listening medium. What do you think? The reason is for this and what should most particularly what should American radio and television do that? It is not doing in an international coverage. (00:10:43) Well, I think you should carry on just the way they are because it leaves us with a clear field. Obviously. I think that if you try to examine why the BBC has been successful, I think there are a number of factors and I think that in it's important to to emphasize. I don't think that we are uniformly successful. We are not always wonderful we make mistakes and we have problems. It's not broadcasting internationally is not something where you can be uniquely excellent the whole time but I think one distinguishing feature is that we try to take a global view. We try to report the world not from the position of London or any other particular City, but from a sort of almost neutral position where we say, what is happening in your part of the world is as important to us as something happening elsewhere and we can actually point to examples where we have begun to report a crisis. Well before other people identified it I think one good example is the former Yugoslavia where we had a very talented correspondent there for more than a year before the rest of the media caught up. We've had correspondence in and out of Somalia for the past two or three years. It's not something we've just started reporting and that continuity the fact that we have people who know the background have been involved in the story for not just a few weeks or a few months, but over a very long period gives us our competitive Advantage when it comes to reporting so the global view and the specialist correspondence and a commitment on our I'd to see the story through we don't send in a team of firemen who hit the ground running file a couple of dozen reports and go home. We keep people there we have reporters who live in countries mixed with the people cover the story year after year after year. And if the story dies away a little bit we don't pull them out. We keep them there and I think that commitment gives us another great (00:12:41) strength. I would you rank CNN. (00:12:45) I think CNN is poorly in Tony new dimension to International broadcasting and I wouldn't want to underestimate it. We I think in many ways what they do is complementary to what we do. They're quite distinct products. But in many ways, they go together rather. Well, we have different strengths. I mean they have a lot of money we don't so that's that's one difference that enables them to buy a lot of technology which we find difficult to to get our hands on they have a lot of satellite time worldwide. They can pull in pictures live from wherever it's happening. I mean certainly the recent events in Moscow has shown CNN at its best. I mean tremendous pictures right close up looking at the White House what I think they're less successful at is explaining what's going on and I sometimes worry that they end up looking like is looking like it like a football game where you got the cameras running but you have no idea Who's Who and I think that's the strength we have it's that analytical ability to deliver a correspondent from Moscow or elsewhere who can explain the background who can give you a proper interpretation or explanation of what they think is happening. And again that strength is built on our network of (00:13:54) Correspondence. Take another question here. You're absurd. (00:13:58) Yes. I work 12 years in Africa and got most of my news from the BBC Africa service and BBC World Service. Now line back in the u.s. I can't keep up with the African news because it just doesn't get here. I listen to BBC World Service here. But all I hear about is Somalia and South Africa do See a way either through BBC World Service or through other ways of getting that information that I could get the African news here in detail so I can keep up with many countries in Africa. I think the short answer might be no in the longer term. I'm sure the answer is yes. I'm convinced that in the next few years were going to see a dramatic change in the way that people use radio television and computers and they'll be much greater. They'll be a much greater interaction between them. It will be possible. I'm sure in the next year or so to access radio programming either in audio or in script pretty much according to your choice. You'll be able to look in the systems and decide what it is. You want to see what information you want you to get your hands on it and you can already see that kind of deal being pulled together by telecommunications companies and cable companies computer firms and looking at interactive systems. I know it sounds any journalist that starts talking about technical technological change is always accused of being slightly utopian or romantic. But the speed of change in the Communications business is so great that I'm convinced that it will not be many years before academic Specialists or people who want to access that kind of quite narrow information will be able to do so easily. (00:15:42) Our guest is Bob jarvan's who is editor of the BBC's World Service news. Let's take another caller with a question hire a Minnesota Public Radio. Go ahead. Listen, I'm calling from Fargo North Dakota. Yes, sir, and join it to the question again. Could you turn your radio down sir? Here you go, you bet. Which has a very good reputation. If you also do the same thing to us, it will be very hard for us outside Africa to hear the news that are so much repressed from going up by these dictators in very much want BBC to come out and focus on Africa give us more information on Africa and Olivia have a big audience. Okay, that's basically the gentleman suggesting that the people in Africa need a lot more truthful solid information because what they hear generally isn't very truthful. (00:16:51) I think that Africa is a region with particular problems in terms of the media and one indicator of that is that the BBC's African services are very very successful. We have audiences in some countries which are greater than those of the domestic broadcaster and it must indicate a basic dilemma a basic problem for for the governments of those countries. It's very gratifying for us to feel that we have these enormous audiences that we play an important part in people's lives that we are somehow of critical importance to them as a journalist. I would be happy to feel that we could help develop the domestic media that the indigenous media in Africa. I would help I would like to think that both by example and by practical training that we are helping (00:17:41) African (00:17:41) broadcasters in particular to develop because in the longer term, although it's nice to have it is nice to have these audiences in the millions and in countries across Africa, I think that Africa's economic and social development is going to depend on having its own media with its own strengths and we are I think would want to continue broadcasting to Africa both on radio and television and I'm sure we will them sure we'll still have big audiences but I think it's intrinsically unhealthy if if a country if the people of a country have to rely on an outsider to hear what's happening at home, (00:18:17) there's the BBC put much emphasis on trying to recruit people who live in the countries to work as correspondence or most of your correspondence British. (00:18:26) We have a most of our we have different layers of Correspondence, most of our staff correspondence of British for lots of good reasons one is that they are not subject to the same pressure as somebody who comes from the country you're in Watching whose family lived there whose jobs may be on the line and it can be very difficult. A local journalist can be chucked in jail. And in many cases BBC contributors have been thrown in prison. The British journalist doesn't necessarily have that problem. And I think also it's fair to say that an outsider can bring a point of view to reporting a country which can be more detached. It's quite difficult. However much you think that your objective everybody has inside them a certain sort of chauvinism or a national pride which makes it hard to report in that sort of detached tone of voice, which I think is important. But yeah, we have we have local journalists in Africa in particular who contribute to our programming and I think they make a Major Impact. (00:19:27) Let's take another question here at our Mike. Yes. I listen to the BBC. Oh and listen to the BBC a lot on NPR and Anderson to news hour as well as (00:19:39) Outlook. And (00:19:42) I often wonder I turned to the BBC to get world news outside of American sources (00:19:47) American government sources and I often find that the BBC quotes Bill Clinton more than they quote John Major and they (00:19:56) quote the state department more than they quote the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in London. Could you explain maybe why you do that? And you know, maybe how you can maybe (00:20:08) include more British quotation so we can understand how the British feel less than we are in. You know, how the Americans feel thank you. Yeah. Well, thank you. I mean, obviously the simple answer is that the what mr. Clinton has to say matters a lot more to more people than what mr. Major says Mr. Major is the prime minister of a smallish country on the northwest of Europe which has some influence worldwide, but it's limited frankly. The United States is a major one. Probably the last superpower at least for the moment. It has tremendous impact on the lives of many people around the world and what mr. Clinton has to say is of importance. It may not always be right, but it's important. Likewise with the state department versus the foreign office, you know, it really is a question of who is going to have the biggest impact on world events. And I'm a you know, there's a Brit I say well, it's you it's not us that's not bad news. I think one reason that we're able to take a slightly more detached view of world events is because we're not the United States because we aren't an important country because we are slightly removed from the very center of power and I don't want to suggest that I think that this gives us any mysterious sort of Athenian ability to advise the Romans, but it certainly in terms of broadcasting enables us to take a slightly more neutral position when we're reporting Somalia or Haiti or or Yugoslavia generally speaking. I mean just as a finish off, I don't see my role as being too representing any particular government certainly the British government pays for our activity. We do have a legal obligation to present their views and I think we more than Fill that, but generally speaking. I would want to feel that I reflected the views of those people who mattered. (00:21:58) Let's take another caller with a question. Hi. Yes, go ahead. I'm calling from Fargo North Dakota, and I want to commend those the world service and the Africa service. I was in Nigeria last year, and without that reporting we would have been badly informed I think on what was going on with the electoral process both VOA and CNN seemed almost to trivialize what was happening, but they were many of us not just expatriates Nigerians as well who felt very strongly about the good job the BBC was doing so, thank you. (00:22:33) Well, thanks very much. I mean Nigeria is an interesting country for us. We have a massive audience in Nigeria in English and in the local languages and this last year or so has been very challenging for us and in particular for our correspondent because although Charles and the glue is based in London. He is in fact a Nigerian and I was saying earlier about the pressures that can put a journalist under I think Charles has done a magnificent job, but often in quite difficult circumstances, (00:23:02) let's take another question here in the theater. I have a question about one of your announcers. I'm curious to know a little bit about Patty Feeny. I listened via shortwave and it's difficult to get information about people like him in this country. (00:23:18) I'm not sure. I know very much about Patty except that he's a convivial companion accomplished broadcaster. He seems to have been around for a very long time and his basic career. I think has been spent in sports journalism. Although it's not as I mean not just in sport. He's done other more unconventional things and he currently fronts one of our I suppose you'd call it a public access program where he takes listeners complaints and generally speaking to flex them. (00:23:54) I have to ask you why is it that the the BBC News casts? I think Colin bulletins, why are they done in such a formal way? There's no actuality tape in them. There's a presenter reading in a fairly stiff style. How did that come to be? And why do you do (00:24:10) that? Well, we try to offer a mix of different formats around use the Straight red bulletin as we call. Is really aimed at people whose first language is not English. We have a very large number of listeners worldwide who understand English but it's they're not they're not bilingual. They have trouble understanding and they may be listening to shortwave radio sets where the reception is. Not necessarily very good. So it's a bit like talking to a slightly deaf. Aren't you have to sort of speak very slowly and very precisely and make sure that they can hear you. So that does to somebody listening listening on FM in the United States sound very stilted but that's the reason (00:24:53) let's take another caller with a question for Bob job ins. Hi, you're on Minnesota Public Radio. Hello. First of all, I wanted to know the last question you asked was something that I wanted to know for a long time and thank you for asking it. I have a related question, which is I noticed at least on that the bulletins the news is introduced by saying the news read by someone so which I think is an interesting way to Put the news first. And in this country, we have a kind of a negative stereotype of millionaire broadcasters who look very good and dressed very well for the news and kind of projecting emphasis more on Celebrity than on the content of the news whether that's true or not. I want to know if there are celebrity broadcasters on the BBC radio or TV in the UK. And do you does the speaker think that there is a difference in the quality or the content of the news between the BBC and the American Media based on this whole idea of celebrity status. (00:25:59) Well, certainly there are use presenters in Britain who are in their own small way celebrities and they may not be billionaires, but they certainly earn more than I do whether this distorts the way that you perceive news. My guess would be yes. I do think that the emphasis on on entertainment the emphasis on making it dramatic exciting and and focusing on the on the hairstyle the suit the tie the the dress of the presenter does actually diminish the importance of what you're saying. I think that you're really looking at two extremes if you like those the caricature of American Broadcasting which is infotainment. It's the it's the superficial the glib the the 30 30 second report from the nuclear Holocaust and in Britain that you have them or ponderous the more if you like the slightly pompous the the The very dry the unemotional I don't think either is terribly successful and I think that if you're broadcasting obviously as a journalist, I feel strongly that the content the information to try to get across is the important thing but I acknowledge that if you cannot project this information in an interesting way in a way which people find relevant you've blown it. There's no good being right? There's no good being well-informed. There's no good being objective or Acura anything else unless you're interesting. It's really a question of balance. If you're so interesting that nobody actually has time to find out what you're trying to tell them that's as dangerous as being very boring (00:27:37) Our Guest today is Bob jarmons editor of the BBC's World Service news and we are broadcasting live today from the University of Minnesota's Kaufman Memorial Union the theater lecture hall at Kauffman and nice audience full of nice audience here turned out today with questions and those of you who haven't had a chance yet. There's a mic up here feel. Rita to come up and ask your question this job and I have to ask you now you spent a lot of time as a foreign correspondent. Is that pretty romantic colorful existence or is it kind of tedious? What do you what is a foreign correspondent do during the course of an (00:28:15) average day? I think with red with hindsight in retrospect. I think it's the best thing I ever did. I must be crazy to give it up. You know, I was I was having a really good time and now I work in an office and I never go home and I never see my family and it's just it's hell. So being a foreign correspondent is definitely a good job. What do you do? Well, you work 24 hours a day is what you do because nothing absolutely nothing that you do apart maybe from sleep is separate from your job of trying to understand the country you're working in and that means that every time you talk to somebody every time you read a newspaper every time you watch television, you're basically working. It's very hard to cut yourself off. The rewards are enormous. Not financially. I mean the BBC pays peanuts, but the excitement of being somewhere and seeing history unwind in front of you is just At the time it's pretty exciting. But with hindsight you just think I was so privileged to be there (00:29:15) occasionally, you know on here at so much anymore, but certainly during the Cold War used to hear talk about correspondence for various news agencies actually being spies. That's true. (00:29:26) Certainly that have been journalist whooping spies. Yeah sure usually pretty unsuccessful journalist, but they've inspires I'm always surprised what intelligence Services sort of think that a journalist is going to tell them something they don't know but then I figure intelligence Services often don't know very much they gather a lot of data, but they never actually sift through it and make conclusions draw conclusions from it which you know, which tell them very much so journalists are pretty often wrong you say to somebody hey what's going to happen the told him and it's wrong intelligence Services make a career out of being wrong. They they have all these analysts sitting away beavering away during up information and they make these predictions and they turn out to be rubbish. So yeah, you know, the object list gets Trapped into it, but my guess is that most good journalists don't have very much to do with it. (00:30:16) Let's take another question here. Thank you Gary. Um, I was wondering I've noticed a big difference in format between American news or radio news and the BBC World News is that you quote newspaper headlines very often. I was wondering if you could comment on that that seems kind of interesting. (00:30:35) I'm not sure quite what you mean, but certainly we have programs which are what we call Press reviews. They look at what the Press says about a particular story and I would guess in a foreign correspondent trying to report a story would keep an eye on what newspapers in that country are saying it's often tells you more about a country to find out what the media are doing than you'd expect. I remember vividly when a bougie had was murdered in Tunis some Israeli Commandos went ashore in the killed. Guy who was the one of the city of PLO People based in Tunas? And to this radio ran that story number 10, right that lead story was something about the the president going off and visiting affirming complex somewhere in the second story was a story about the president doing something else and so on down the bulletin until they finally sort of said and by the way, this guy got killed last night now that is why organizations like the BBC World Service survive because they're broadcasting to countries where When it comes to it the government tries to suppress or distort or diminish information, which people need to (00:31:45) know. Tell us about very briefly how you were on hand when Anwar Sadat was assassinated. I understand you were dangerously close to him. (00:31:56) Not sure how dangerously close I was certainly close. I also made the mistake of taking my seven-year-old son. This was a military parade which was held annually in Egypt and it however anti-militarist you are. It's always quite an interesting display. Does she see this is the latest military equipment. There are bands there are parachutist that are flybys bye-bye aircraft. It's quite an exciting they are so I took my seven-year-old son and his best friend to this and we were sitting there when a truck stopped and they open fire on the presidential stand which was about a hundred feet away. I was terrified. I've been shot at before but I was terrified I was terrified because I didn't know what I was going to say to this small boy's parents when I went home and said he'd been shot. So I try to keep the kids out the way. There's a story it was one of the biggest I've covered live as it were we weren't able to go live because of the communications problems, but we were on air within about 30 minutes of that event. And that was another one of these stories where the impact was just I mean the potential impact was appalling in reality as we know now the peace initiative which Sadat and begin started sort of staggered on through the decade and has just about come to another I mean whether it's a conclusion or just another step on the way, (00:33:19) let's go back to the phones and the question for Bob jarvan's how you're on Minnesota Public Radio when it comes to Muslims why BBC will have to specify as Muslim terrorists lamech fundamentalist, but in the Irish Republican Army is case they are not Roman Catholic or Christian terrorist over there in Bosnia is the Muslim dominated government, but Crushes are not Roman Catholic dominated and serves are not Russian, Orthodox Christian dominated. (00:33:52) Or I will clear up 30 clear up one point. We do not as a matter of editorial policy use the word terrorist anytime it sometimes comes up in direct quotation of we're quoting a politician or using that politicians Voice live. But we as a editorial policy as to avoid the word wherever possible certainly there are occasions, when we draw attention to the fact that somebody comes with organization which is based on religion and certainly that comes up in both the Middle East and in parts of Europe when we refer to Muslim groups. We have a particular problem with fundamentalism because I think that many Muslims would argue that it's an inappropriate word and I must say I have some sympathy with that but nevertheless using everyday English you do need to have a word which conveys to your ordinary listener what you're talking about. The reason we call the Bosnian government mainly Muslim is not in a pejorative sense. It's partly to try to indicate that not every member of the government in Bosnia-Herzegovina is actually a Muslim. It is a coalition government. The Muslims are the largest group in that government in Northern Ireland to finish off. We certainly do draw attention to the fact that the participants are Protestant or Roman Catholic. Although I think many people in Britain would argue that on both sides. The activities are barely political or religious and they are in many cases purely criminal (00:35:19) other callers on the line with a question for bomb job ins. Hello. Hello. I just wanted to express my gratitude. My wife and I were Peace Corps Volunteers in Guatemala in a very rural area with no access to any type of news and we listen to the BBC twice a day and it was by far the best signal we could get we got the CBC and the voice of America as well. And then I had a question for him. I was just wondering how much it costs the BBC. to infect the broadcast on the shortwave Good question. (00:35:50) I can't tell you the answer. I'm afraid I know that our total budget for overseas broadcasting is in the region of 200 million dollars a year. But how much of that is accounted for by the cost of broadcasting on shortwave? I'm afraid I can't tell you that's the total cost including all of the journalism and all of the broadcasting activity as well as the transmission cost (00:36:14) staying a question here in the theater. Yes as a as an American or a foreign correspondent for an American television news station or network. It's often difficult to get stories aired that haven't been previously validated in print form through various Elite newspapers or magazines. Is this also true for British television as well. (00:36:40) I think less than it used to be like remembers a foreign correspondent being intensely frustrated by the sense of having a good story, which nobody was interested in. Until it was in a major newspaper. In fact on one occasion. I had an exclusive interview with somebody who had been arrested and beaten by the police in the country. It was a British girl who was a nurse. She was very young and very vulnerable and had obviously had a very hard time and I had this wonderful interview on tape and nobody in London seemed terribly interested. So in a fit of malice, I gave the tape to a print journalist who made it to the front page over that night and I was punished by being woken up repeatedly Through the Night by other parts of the BBC asking me to do the story and really asking me why I'd missed it. So I think this is definitely a problem. I mean desk editors tend to like stories where somebody has done some of the work for them. They're working on the pressure. It's nice to know that you're covering the story to everybody else is covering the trouble with that is who makes the first decision and I hope that at the BBC that we are moving into a More I don't know dreaded word proactive phase where we're prepared to stick our heads out and say we think this is important and we're going to go with it. Even if we're on our own (00:37:57) my sense. Is that a lot of times in this country when that happens it has to do with competitive pressures. You don't want to be the only person without that particular story whose BBC compete with (00:38:08) well, I think internationally we compete with lots of people we compete with CNN we compete with national broadcasters. We compete with international radio broadcasters like the VOA but we also compete like all the media for people's time with everything that people do. I mean if you have a choice between watching the video and listening to a shortwave radio, what's going to make you hold on the video what's going to make you say what I listen to the news first, and it's got to be that ability to put over a product which is competitive which is interesting which is relevant, which makes that people feel they have to listen (00:38:39) take another caller with a question for Bob cabins high and mr. Jabez. I'm particularly interested in how you View your responsibility to educate the public about vital Global Trends compared to the Daily News in particular. I'm thinking about the subject of continued population growth and the related erosion of marginal Farmland reduction of per capita food decrease in resources Extinction of species and so on for example in the United States most political Leaders with whom I've talked about this issue do not even know. The basic fact that world population is increasing by nearly a hundred million people per year. (00:39:18) Well, this is one of these problems where you know quest for objectivity fairness and Detachment. We run up against points of view where people think that their arguments their point of view is so clearly and manifestly right that we ought to be supporting them. I think we should be reporting your views reporting the the subject that you're talking about but doing so in the same way and in the same tradition that we cover politics and it not taking sides. I call it the Dolphin syndrome. It's very easy to get very to be very neutral when it comes to a straightforward political crisis like Somalia or Yugoslavia where you're very detached but when you start talking about environmental issues or population pressures, there's a temptation to see it as being a good thing. And therefore you have to support it. I think you have to bear in mind that although many people would agree with your point of view. There are many governments in the world and many people in the world who think that it's a western plot trying to limit their population and that the Western industrial countries are somehow trying to limit the way that they limit their their own industrial strength by keeping their populations small. So all the subjects you mention are of critical importance people need to be well-informed. It's our duty to report them, but it's also our duty to do so in a way which allows people to make up their own mind. (00:40:47) Let's take a question here in the theater. When I spent a few months in West Africa is as an intern reporting. I noticed that most of the stories were covered in packs packs of journalists going to press conferences, and I'm wondering if you see this as a problem and if so how reporters can break away from the pack to better cover the story in a place like Africa. (00:41:11) Yeah. I think that you're right that journalists tend to hunt in packs and in developing countries, that's no bad thing it helps. People to they could pull information they can cooperate and that's also I think that's okay. I'm happy with that. But you're also right that you need to be able to say that we have our we have our own sort of editorial Viewpoint we can get out there and do things which we think are important and I think we can say that with our hands on our hearts. There are several stories in West Africa, for example, I mean, certainly that Iberian Civil War we had the only Western journalist based in Liberia for many months and we continue to keep the program in there right the way through he was there when President doe was assassinated right up to the end. She was actually physically in the building when the shooting broke out and she did a brilliant job, but we kept her there because we thought the story was important even though many other Western news organizations didn't write the story that highly (00:42:12) Let's take another caller with a question for Bob job ins hello. Trust me. Why does the BBC insist on calling Beijing Peking all the time? (00:42:25) Well good news. We changed about four weeks ago. We issued a what you call it an edict changing the name of the Chinese capital from Peking to Beijing because we felt that having held up for a while that the consensus worldwide in English. Was that Beijing was the more appropriate name. So we're with you there (00:42:50) is a question in the theater and I often we hear the beginnings of new stories, but then there's no follow-up a few weeks later. I was wondering what happens to new stories after their initially reported. They just go off in a closet or something or what happens. (00:43:05) Well, yeah, you're right you stories just fizzle out. We try to stay with them. We try to hang in there. We try to follow them up, but it's very difficult. We have a longer attention span at World Service than some of the other news media and I think that that is I would be I'll be proud of but determined to to preserve as well nevertheless. You only have a limited amount of air time. You only have a limited amount of money and you only have a limited amount of staff and eventually you have to worry more about today's crisis than yesterday's I think it's important in your news and current affairs programming on radio or television or for that matter in newspapers every so often to pause and say whatever happened to because after whatever happened to is that the things that you thought were happening didn't happen. The other thing I think is important is to try from time to time to detach yourself from reporting just the events to considering the processes or the trends or the longer-term developments because they are often much more important to what's happening in a country than just the day-to-day sort of soundbite type events. (00:44:19) We're talking today with Bob job ensues editor of the BBC's World Service news special broadcast here on. Midday. We're coming to you live from the University of Minnesota's Kaufman Memorial Union. We're in the theater lecture hall this afternoon. We have time for a couple more questions. Let's go back to the phones. Hello. Yes. I'm going to a place caller. I appreciate very much the integrity and the quality of both BBC and Minnesota Public Radio, but what I'm concerned about is the fact that I happen to belong to the world citizen organization, and we went to schools and places and be and help them to become P sites and I find it fascinating it find it very fascinating to see how interested the youth. Are in world peace and the fact that it cannot be well in one country until his well in all countries, but how are we going to get this across so that we give them some hope for tomorrow's world? Okay. (00:45:11) Yeah, I mean, I don't disagree with that, but I'm only a journalist here and there's not an awful lot. You can do except try to make sure that you're telling people as truthfully as you care. What's happening what they do with the information at the end of it is is really very much up to them. And it always I think one of the problems with any kind of media activity is the sense that people feel that we're more powerful than we are. We've got more influence and we have that. All we have to do is wave a magic wand and everything's going to be okay. My experience says that's not the case and that it's all a bit more. It takes longer to make the kind of change you're talking about and I would guess that a lot of the change you're arguing for in favor of is the kind of change which comes to education it comes through environment. It comes through family and the media is not going to be the key (00:46:04) thing. You hear from time to time in this country about the all kind of the media. Spira see and the implication. I've never been quite clear on this but it seems like the implication is that there is a cabal of journalists or media Moguls or somebody who gets together and kind of sets the news agenda. Do you hear the same complaints in (00:46:25) Britain? Yeah, I think that most people look at the the media as a whole and they think these guys are up to something. They're they're they're they're setting up the agenda that it's in their interest and to be fair. There's an element of Truth in that that it's easier to sell these papers to make good TV programs to make Lively radio. If you're talking about conflict confrontation that kind of drama. I just makes for better. It's a better product people think it's more exciting. How do you then answer somebody who says but basically the picture you draw of my country is inaccurate that it's a peaceful place. Really the thing that you're talking about is an aberration. It's an exception and that really you are misrepresenting me to the rest of World and it's not just you. It's the whole of the media. And I don't think there is an easy direct answer to that except to say that at World Service. We try to bear in mind that kind of criticism. We try very hard to say. Okay, we take your point will try to report your country, even when there isn't an earthquake or a riot or a revolution will try to stay around and talk about some of the other things that happened. It won't always make the news broadcast, but it will make other programs and I think that that's an important thing to do. (00:47:44) Let's take one more caller. I think we've got time for one more question. Hello. Yes. Good afternoon. I have been working in Belgrade with the UN and prior to that I had was working in turkey and we'll be going back to Belgrade next week and I want to make a point and ask a question one was I wanted to affirm that in both countries where these Russia countries I've been in how valuable BBC News has been whether it was in native language for example incurred. And Kurdish or or also the English broadcast in in Belgrade for people who are in State Control news environments that information is invaluable. But I had a question most recently there. Were there was this big blow up in the press and I I'm not sure how much coverage it got in the States, but I know in Europe it was very big the baby are Mama story where they were trying to save all these children out of I think it was Sarajevo and then there was another incident where there was a lone British nurse that was trying to get these children out of monstar and I'm wondering your perspective on the ethics of how that was handled have that was (00:48:57) reported stank. It was one of these problems where it seemed to the people on the spot and it certainly seemed to me in London at the time but here was a very Vivid way of illustrating the the the drama the crisis. The ethical issues in in Yugoslavia at the end of it you ended up feeling used and you felt that you had perhaps served your audience's badly because the one child the one the one person story really did not give an accurate impression of what was happening there. And I think this is a constant debate is when you focus on one tiny part of the story because it's dramatic and exciting or emotional and somehow you failed to locate that in the wider context. You've often failed in your journalistic duty (00:49:50) job is very briefly any big crises lurking out there that we haven't heard much about yet that we should know more about and pay attention to (00:49:58) help. I'm sure that that we've covered the basic areas of the interesting thing for a world broadcaster is that everybody thinks that their crisis is the most important and that if you talk to our listeners, they'd say yeah, your coverage of Somalia is great, but you have Mentioned Vietnam or doing Wonders on on Haiti. But when did you last mention Malawi? That's the problem of being a world broadcaster. Everybody's got a problem. Everybody has a crisis and our job is to try to connect them.