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Thu 05 January 2012 08:12 GMT | 3:12 Local Time
by Alsou Taheri, the pseudonym of a journalist working at RFE/RL in Prague.
These days, Soviet-style samizdat is doing the rounds at the Prague headquarters of Radio Free Europe/ Radio Liberty. It is a press release on the letter to Croatian government by Snjezana Pelivan, a Croatian journalist living in Prague. Her case against the Czech Republic as a country that tolerates the national discrimination practised on its territory by the American RFE/RL, is in the European Court of Human Rights. In her letter, she officially requests the government of Croatia to support her lawsuit in Strasbourg.
Pelivan's letter is passed clandestinely from hand to hand, like forbidden fruit. Computers are not trusted. It is an open secret here that the RFE/RL management monitors all intranet communications. At RFE/RL, many knew Snjezana personally and retain fond memories of her. Many remain close to her. And there is hardly anyone who does not know about her human rights case against the Radio in the Czech courts, and of her present claim against the Czech Republic as the host country to RFE/RL.
In 28 languages, RFE/RL broadcasts to 21 so-called "target countries". In Prague, the Radio employs hundreds of foreign nationals forming the great majority of broadcasting departments. Eighteen of the RFE/RL broadcasting languages are spoken predominantly by Muslim people. Snjezana Pelivan, daughter of the first prime minister of independent Bosnia and Herzegovina, was responsible for the placement of RFE/RL programs with affiliated radio stations abroad, particularly in the Caucasus and former Yugoslavia. The termination of her employment was met with disbelief and consternation.
International lawsuit for international hospitality
In 1995, RFE/RL moved from Munich, Germany to Prague. The radio is subordinate to the federal agency, the BBG (Broadcasting Board of Governors), in Washington. The BBG is appointed by the president of the United States and confirmed by the Senate. Ex officio, it includes the secretary of state, at present Hillary Clinton. Simultaneously, the BBG serves as the Board of Directors for the same RFE/RL.
With a straight face and disdain for the listener's intelligence, RFE/RL represents itself as "independent" and "private". The insiders laugh: it's about as ridiculous as calling Russia's Gazprom an independent private company. At that, Gazprom has slightly over 50 percent of state capital. RFE/RL has 100. The largest American civil institution abroad, RFE/RL is fully financed by the US Congress. And it is anything but independent. The influential BBG, which controls and directs all American non-military broadcasters abroad, says on its website that it "makes all major policy determinations governing the operations of RFE/RL", "provides worldwide personnel management policies, programs, and services".
The practical consequence of the BBG-designed personnel policies, writes Snjezana Pelivan in her letter, avidly read in RFE/RL corridors, is that all foreign journalists, producers and other specialists employed by RFE/RL in Prague, are provided with uniform work contracts based deceptively on American labour laws. American laws don't cover foreigners outside the United States.
RFE/RL contracts with foreigners have the only purpose: to strip them of any legal defence – be it in the United States or in the Czech Republic. American courts, which are open to Americans, are off limits to them. Czech courts, on the other hand, take inconsistent and mutually excluding decisions as to what laws shall be used for foreigners working for RFE/RL – strict Czech laws, which exclude arbitrary terminations and cover Czech workers at RFE/RL, or the regulations which give free rein to the employer contained in the discriminatory contracts provided by RFE/RL to foreigners. In Munich, notes Snjezana Pelivan, even when it was in the American zone of occupation, American RFE/RL had to abide by German labour laws.
The "pro and contra" ping pong with human fates, continues Pelivan, goes on in Czech courts for years. Presently, the case of an Armenian journalist, the mother of three young children, Anna Karapetian, similar to Pelivan's lawsuit, is again in the Czech Supreme court – repeatedly, after making already two full rounds of the lower courts. It is the sixth time that her claim against RFE/RL will be handled by Czech judges.
The case of Snjezana Pelivan was heard four times. Her employment with RFE/EL was terminated without any preliminary warnings or any reason being provided. Simultaneously, the RFE/RL management demanded that she sign a letter stating that she accepted the termination and would not question it in courts. She refused. In retaliation, the American employer withheld her severance compensation for years of impeccable service. In the same fashion, Anna Karapetian's contract was terminated. She had worked for RFE/RL for 12 years.
The acute interest in Pelivan's letter is dictated not only by the fact that she was the first to contest her termination in the Czech courts. Anna Karapetian became another rebel. But many of their former co-workers at RFE/RL were forced by financial and family reasons to succumb to demands and the arbitrariness of American management. They accepted the "hush" money, signed the statements depriving them of their basic civil right to appeal against mistreatment, and left. Every foreigner at the "human-rights" Radio knows that he or she could be treated as an expendable mercenary, too. As Afghan woman Saliha K was treated, or more recently, two Ukrainian journalists. Who is next?
To Urbi et Orbi, RFE/RL solemnly proclaims its official mission: "To empower people in their struggle against violations of human rights," "to promote democratic values and institutions," "strengthen civil societies by projecting democratic values," "provide a model for local media…"
The BBG is no less ambitious: "Help audiences in authoritarian countries understand the principles and practices of democratic, free and just societies."
In reality, writes Snjezana Pelivan, the Czech Republic tolerates on its territory a situation in which "fewer foreign detainees are placed in a legal vacuum at the US naval base on Guantanamo, Cuba, than foreign journalists deprived of legal protection by American Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty in Prague".
Havel's legacy as window dressing
On 18 December former Czech President Vaclav Havel, who invited RFE/RL from Munich to Prague, died. Commemorating him, RFE/RL President Steven Korn wrote: "He championed the rights of the powerless… Havel embodied the principles that guide our organization."
Walter Isaacson, BBG chairman, echoed: "We have lost a great champion of justice."
Were they sincere? Have their personnel policies of "no-rights-to-foreigners" - designed by the BBG in Washington and used by RFE/RL in Prague - anything in common with Havel's essay "The Power of the Powerless" directed against the "brutal and arbitrary application of power", "hypocrisy and lies", "arbitrary abuse of power"? Havel's perception of RFE/RL's mission was and always remained "old-fashioned": "defence of human rights, civic rights and human dignity". Rather, their lip service to the memory of the great humanitarian enables them, to use words from his essay again, "to deceive their conscience and conceal their true position both from the world and from themselves". Did they ever read that essay written in 1978 by Vaclav Havel, the dissident?
Snjezana Pelivan quotes Czech Senator Jaromir Stetina, vice-chairman of the Senate caucus of the governing party, member of the Senate Committee on Foreign Policy, Defense and Security, who described RFE/RL labour policies in the Czech Republic as "patently indecent, unfair, cynical and hypocritical".
When she comes to Prague, Hillary Clinton usually visits RFE/RL and makes a speech. Last time, she thanked the staff for helping "to create a broad international agreement with values that respect human dignity, individual rights and responsibilities".
Among her listeners were hundreds of the "rightless aborigines" as RFE/RL foreign employees were once called by Czech newspaper Lidove noviny.
In her "Petition to Call the Witness" addressed to the Czech Constitutional Court, Snjezana Pelivan raised the question if the discriminatory employment policies practised by RFE/RL in the Czech Republic, were dictated by some political necessity. The witness suggested to the Court was Hillary Clinton as a member of the BBG and RFE/RL boards of directors. The Secretary of State was expected in Prague shortly. Czech news agency CTK and major Czech newspapers reported Pelivan's request. Within five days, the Czech Constitutional Court ruled in a five-page long decision against Snjezana Pelivan. However, her request to call Hillary Clinton as a witness was not even mentioned. No reason was given why the witness should not be heard. In its ruling, the Court decided that the virtual absence of legal protection for RFE/RL foreign employees is "compatible with the social, state, and legal order of the Czech Republic".
In his article in Prague newspaper Halo,"Free Europe with Its Own Laws in Colonial Czech Republic?" Vaclav Exner, then the chairman of the Parliamentary Subcommittee on Foreign Relations, commented: "The Constitutional Court indeed achieved a speed record on this matter, as far as I know."
Pelivan's letter is passed clandestinely from hand to hand, like forbidden fruit. Computers are not trusted. It is an open secret here that the RFE/RL management monitors all intranet communications. At RFE/RL, many knew Snjezana personally and retain fond memories of her. Many remain close to her. And there is hardly anyone who does not know about her human rights case against the Radio in the Czech courts, and of her present claim against the Czech Republic as the host country to RFE/RL.
In 28 languages, RFE/RL broadcasts to 21 so-called "target countries". In Prague, the Radio employs hundreds of foreign nationals forming the great majority of broadcasting departments. Eighteen of the RFE/RL broadcasting languages are spoken predominantly by Muslim people. Snjezana Pelivan, daughter of the first prime minister of independent Bosnia and Herzegovina, was responsible for the placement of RFE/RL programs with affiliated radio stations abroad, particularly in the Caucasus and former Yugoslavia. The termination of her employment was met with disbelief and consternation.
International lawsuit for international hospitality
In 1995, RFE/RL moved from Munich, Germany to Prague. The radio is subordinate to the federal agency, the BBG (Broadcasting Board of Governors), in Washington. The BBG is appointed by the president of the United States and confirmed by the Senate. Ex officio, it includes the secretary of state, at present Hillary Clinton. Simultaneously, the BBG serves as the Board of Directors for the same RFE/RL.
With a straight face and disdain for the listener's intelligence, RFE/RL represents itself as "independent" and "private". The insiders laugh: it's about as ridiculous as calling Russia's Gazprom an independent private company. At that, Gazprom has slightly over 50 percent of state capital. RFE/RL has 100. The largest American civil institution abroad, RFE/RL is fully financed by the US Congress. And it is anything but independent. The influential BBG, which controls and directs all American non-military broadcasters abroad, says on its website that it "makes all major policy determinations governing the operations of RFE/RL", "provides worldwide personnel management policies, programs, and services".
The practical consequence of the BBG-designed personnel policies, writes Snjezana Pelivan in her letter, avidly read in RFE/RL corridors, is that all foreign journalists, producers and other specialists employed by RFE/RL in Prague, are provided with uniform work contracts based deceptively on American labour laws. American laws don't cover foreigners outside the United States.
RFE/RL contracts with foreigners have the only purpose: to strip them of any legal defence – be it in the United States or in the Czech Republic. American courts, which are open to Americans, are off limits to them. Czech courts, on the other hand, take inconsistent and mutually excluding decisions as to what laws shall be used for foreigners working for RFE/RL – strict Czech laws, which exclude arbitrary terminations and cover Czech workers at RFE/RL, or the regulations which give free rein to the employer contained in the discriminatory contracts provided by RFE/RL to foreigners. In Munich, notes Snjezana Pelivan, even when it was in the American zone of occupation, American RFE/RL had to abide by German labour laws.
The "pro and contra" ping pong with human fates, continues Pelivan, goes on in Czech courts for years. Presently, the case of an Armenian journalist, the mother of three young children, Anna Karapetian, similar to Pelivan's lawsuit, is again in the Czech Supreme court – repeatedly, after making already two full rounds of the lower courts. It is the sixth time that her claim against RFE/RL will be handled by Czech judges.
The case of Snjezana Pelivan was heard four times. Her employment with RFE/EL was terminated without any preliminary warnings or any reason being provided. Simultaneously, the RFE/RL management demanded that she sign a letter stating that she accepted the termination and would not question it in courts. She refused. In retaliation, the American employer withheld her severance compensation for years of impeccable service. In the same fashion, Anna Karapetian's contract was terminated. She had worked for RFE/RL for 12 years.
The acute interest in Pelivan's letter is dictated not only by the fact that she was the first to contest her termination in the Czech courts. Anna Karapetian became another rebel. But many of their former co-workers at RFE/RL were forced by financial and family reasons to succumb to demands and the arbitrariness of American management. They accepted the "hush" money, signed the statements depriving them of their basic civil right to appeal against mistreatment, and left. Every foreigner at the "human-rights" Radio knows that he or she could be treated as an expendable mercenary, too. As Afghan woman Saliha K was treated, or more recently, two Ukrainian journalists. Who is next?
To Urbi et Orbi, RFE/RL solemnly proclaims its official mission: "To empower people in their struggle against violations of human rights," "to promote democratic values and institutions," "strengthen civil societies by projecting democratic values," "provide a model for local media…"
The BBG is no less ambitious: "Help audiences in authoritarian countries understand the principles and practices of democratic, free and just societies."
In reality, writes Snjezana Pelivan, the Czech Republic tolerates on its territory a situation in which "fewer foreign detainees are placed in a legal vacuum at the US naval base on Guantanamo, Cuba, than foreign journalists deprived of legal protection by American Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty in Prague".
Havel's legacy as window dressing
On 18 December former Czech President Vaclav Havel, who invited RFE/RL from Munich to Prague, died. Commemorating him, RFE/RL President Steven Korn wrote: "He championed the rights of the powerless… Havel embodied the principles that guide our organization."
Walter Isaacson, BBG chairman, echoed: "We have lost a great champion of justice."
Were they sincere? Have their personnel policies of "no-rights-to-foreigners" - designed by the BBG in Washington and used by RFE/RL in Prague - anything in common with Havel's essay "The Power of the Powerless" directed against the "brutal and arbitrary application of power", "hypocrisy and lies", "arbitrary abuse of power"? Havel's perception of RFE/RL's mission was and always remained "old-fashioned": "defence of human rights, civic rights and human dignity". Rather, their lip service to the memory of the great humanitarian enables them, to use words from his essay again, "to deceive their conscience and conceal their true position both from the world and from themselves". Did they ever read that essay written in 1978 by Vaclav Havel, the dissident?
Snjezana Pelivan quotes Czech Senator Jaromir Stetina, vice-chairman of the Senate caucus of the governing party, member of the Senate Committee on Foreign Policy, Defense and Security, who described RFE/RL labour policies in the Czech Republic as "patently indecent, unfair, cynical and hypocritical".
When she comes to Prague, Hillary Clinton usually visits RFE/RL and makes a speech. Last time, she thanked the staff for helping "to create a broad international agreement with values that respect human dignity, individual rights and responsibilities".
Among her listeners were hundreds of the "rightless aborigines" as RFE/RL foreign employees were once called by Czech newspaper Lidove noviny.
In her "Petition to Call the Witness" addressed to the Czech Constitutional Court, Snjezana Pelivan raised the question if the discriminatory employment policies practised by RFE/RL in the Czech Republic, were dictated by some political necessity. The witness suggested to the Court was Hillary Clinton as a member of the BBG and RFE/RL boards of directors. The Secretary of State was expected in Prague shortly. Czech news agency CTK and major Czech newspapers reported Pelivan's request. Within five days, the Czech Constitutional Court ruled in a five-page long decision against Snjezana Pelivan. However, her request to call Hillary Clinton as a witness was not even mentioned. No reason was given why the witness should not be heard. In its ruling, the Court decided that the virtual absence of legal protection for RFE/RL foreign employees is "compatible with the social, state, and legal order of the Czech Republic".
In his article in Prague newspaper Halo,"Free Europe with Its Own Laws in Colonial Czech Republic?" Vaclav Exner, then the chairman of the Parliamentary Subcommittee on Foreign Relations, commented: "The Constitutional Court indeed achieved a speed record on this matter, as far as I know."
On Exner's initiative, the Czech parliament already twice, on 11 June 2009 and 4 February 2010, discussed the abhorrent RFE/RL labour policies. Vaclav Exner was a Communist deputy.
However, stresses Snjezana Pelivan, the indignation at the immoral policies and actions of RFE/RL cuts in the Czech Republic across the whole political spectrum. Senator Jaromir Stetina is actively anti-Communist and pro-American. In February 2010, he addressed American senators with an open letter "Actions of Radio Free Europe Damage the Czech Republic and United States". A year later, he sent a public appeal to Hillary Clinton - "From Fame to Shame: Stop Human Rights Violations and National Discrimination of Foreign Employees at Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty". The senator's letters were broadly covered by Czech and international mass media.
However, stresses Snjezana Pelivan, the indignation at the immoral policies and actions of RFE/RL cuts in the Czech Republic across the whole political spectrum. Senator Jaromir Stetina is actively anti-Communist and pro-American. In February 2010, he addressed American senators with an open letter "Actions of Radio Free Europe Damage the Czech Republic and United States". A year later, he sent a public appeal to Hillary Clinton - "From Fame to Shame: Stop Human Rights Violations and National Discrimination of Foreign Employees at Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty". The senator's letters were broadly covered by Czech and international mass media.
The Czech government, however, does not dare to appeal to the Broadcasting Board of Governors in Washington and request an end to the violation of Czech legislative sovereignty, writes Snjezana Pelivan.
Not a Prague Spring but Prague Winter
Asking the government in Zagreb to support her legal claim against the Czech Republic, she mentions the official statistics: out of 158 cases against the Czech Republic tried by the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg, Prague has won only five.
In his broadly circulated Open Letter to Hillary Clinton, Senator Stetina suggested an alternative solution to the court battles scandalous for RFE/RL and the Czech Republic:
"The ongoing ugly lawsuits should and could be stopped by a dignified peaceful resolution acceptable to all the parties involved, including the Czech Republic."
As was reported recently by The Croatian Times, published in English in Zagreb, Snjezana Pelivan is sceptical: "If such an offer comes, we'll consider it. It is just that Americans spit on this country openly and smile nicely. And Prague wipes itself dry and keeps smiling, too."
To illustrate national discrimination, Snjezana Pelivan gives the following example, among others: "A foreign woman working for RFE/RL will receive maternity leave in accordance with the RFE/RL Corporate Policy Manual. It is almost three months shorter than the leave provided by Czech law to anyone else in the Czech Republic, including Czech employees of RFE/RL. But a foreign employee of the Radio has no place to complain – neither to the American courts, nor the Czech ones. In the sovereign Czech Republic, the American RFE/RL is the most sovereign judge in its own court without the right of appeal."
Foreign journalists working on the uniformly discriminatory contracts provided to them by RFE/RL know this all too well. Their comments are bitter: "Here the Wild West met the Wild East". Most of them sincerely share the high ideals and goals of the RFE/RL official mission. It is not with a light heart that they read the now innumerable articles in the Czech and international mass media, print and electronic, denouncing their place of work: "hypocrisy", "betrayal of ideals", "violation of human rights", "lawlessness", "double standards", "moral disaster", "fraud", "cynicism", "Guantanamo in Prague", "public idiocy instead of public diplomacy", and the like.
In low voices they discuss Pelivan's letter at American RFE/RL, just as samizdat was discussed in the Communist autocracies. But can they do anything to protect their own "rights of the powerless"? For them, this question is not theoretical anymore.
They are professionals working with information. They are fully informed that their colleague in the Moscow bureau, Karen Agamirov, organized a trade union, which on 25 March 2009 forced the unwilling RFE/RL management to sign a collective agreement which provides protection for employees. But they are also aware that last year Karen Agamirov was fired on a far-fetched pretext. The RFE/RL management has a long and vindictive memory.
They know that the RFE/RL acting director of communications, Julian Knapp, got sick and tired of publicly defending the Radio's deceptive labour policies. He took his hat and left Prague last September. John O'Sullivan, RFE/RL executive editor, is about to go, too.
Yes, they are very well informed. Of their own situation and of the world around them. In turn, they inform their audiences – about the "Arab Spring", the "Moscow December", "Occupy Wall Street", protests in Kiev …
They are my colleagues. And from what I hear, it seems they are about to protest publicly against their feudal status at the "human-rights" radio. To judge by the current season in Prague, their collective protest will be called a "Prague Winter". The heat is on.
Alsou Taheri is the pseudonym of a journalist working at RFE/RL in Prague.
News.Az
Not a Prague Spring but Prague Winter
Asking the government in Zagreb to support her legal claim against the Czech Republic, she mentions the official statistics: out of 158 cases against the Czech Republic tried by the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg, Prague has won only five.
In his broadly circulated Open Letter to Hillary Clinton, Senator Stetina suggested an alternative solution to the court battles scandalous for RFE/RL and the Czech Republic:
"The ongoing ugly lawsuits should and could be stopped by a dignified peaceful resolution acceptable to all the parties involved, including the Czech Republic."
As was reported recently by The Croatian Times, published in English in Zagreb, Snjezana Pelivan is sceptical: "If such an offer comes, we'll consider it. It is just that Americans spit on this country openly and smile nicely. And Prague wipes itself dry and keeps smiling, too."
To illustrate national discrimination, Snjezana Pelivan gives the following example, among others: "A foreign woman working for RFE/RL will receive maternity leave in accordance with the RFE/RL Corporate Policy Manual. It is almost three months shorter than the leave provided by Czech law to anyone else in the Czech Republic, including Czech employees of RFE/RL. But a foreign employee of the Radio has no place to complain – neither to the American courts, nor the Czech ones. In the sovereign Czech Republic, the American RFE/RL is the most sovereign judge in its own court without the right of appeal."
Foreign journalists working on the uniformly discriminatory contracts provided to them by RFE/RL know this all too well. Their comments are bitter: "Here the Wild West met the Wild East". Most of them sincerely share the high ideals and goals of the RFE/RL official mission. It is not with a light heart that they read the now innumerable articles in the Czech and international mass media, print and electronic, denouncing their place of work: "hypocrisy", "betrayal of ideals", "violation of human rights", "lawlessness", "double standards", "moral disaster", "fraud", "cynicism", "Guantanamo in Prague", "public idiocy instead of public diplomacy", and the like.
In low voices they discuss Pelivan's letter at American RFE/RL, just as samizdat was discussed in the Communist autocracies. But can they do anything to protect their own "rights of the powerless"? For them, this question is not theoretical anymore.
They are professionals working with information. They are fully informed that their colleague in the Moscow bureau, Karen Agamirov, organized a trade union, which on 25 March 2009 forced the unwilling RFE/RL management to sign a collective agreement which provides protection for employees. But they are also aware that last year Karen Agamirov was fired on a far-fetched pretext. The RFE/RL management has a long and vindictive memory.
They know that the RFE/RL acting director of communications, Julian Knapp, got sick and tired of publicly defending the Radio's deceptive labour policies. He took his hat and left Prague last September. John O'Sullivan, RFE/RL executive editor, is about to go, too.
Yes, they are very well informed. Of their own situation and of the world around them. In turn, they inform their audiences – about the "Arab Spring", the "Moscow December", "Occupy Wall Street", protests in Kiev …
They are my colleagues. And from what I hear, it seems they are about to protest publicly against their feudal status at the "human-rights" radio. To judge by the current season in Prague, their collective protest will be called a "Prague Winter". The heat is on.
Alsou Taheri is the pseudonym of a journalist working at RFE/RL in Prague.
News.Az
Via Yimber Gaviria, Colombia
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