Rohrabacher Urges VOA Broadcasts to Balochistan

The Baloch people occupy homelands that stretch across the borders of the three countries and their “secular, tolerant and liberal tradition is now in danger” of being deprived of access to independent media, said the congressman.
WASHINGTON – Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Europe, Eurasia, and Emerging Threats, called on the overseer of the Voice of America to initiate native-language broadcasting to the Baloch people living in Iran, Pakistan, and Afghanistan.

The Baloch people occupy homelands that stretch across the borders of the three countries and their “secular, tolerant and liberal tradition is now in danger” of being deprived of access to independent media, said the congressman. The three dominant states, he said, are attempting to create a “single-state identity” – Persian, Punjab, and Pashtun – and impose the values of their respective religious sects.

In a letter to John Lansing, chief executive officer of the Broadcasting Board of Governors, Rohrabacher said, “[N]ative language broadcasting could help to provide Baloch with non-biased news and liberal and democratic values. It would also help to preserve Baloch people language and its secular culture.”