Internet – On RSF’s CIA connection

“In China you must deal now and then with Reporters without Borders, isn’t it,” asked one of my new Belgium friends, who eagerly admitted to have a Maoist past. Of course I had be in touch with the Paris-based organization RSF and earlier this year I actually refused their kind offer to nominate this weblog for a new kind of weblog freedom award. As an non-Chinese, not writing in Chinese getting such an nomination for a China-focused weblog seemed odd to me, to put it mildly. “Google ‘RFS’ in combination with ‘CIA’ and you will get some interesting articles,” my friend added. “It is very similar to how they operated in the past.” ‘They’ referred in this case to the CIA.
Indeed, today I had some time and the result proved that despite on the internet many interesting stories remain within the internet garden of a language or culture despite the technical possibilities to jump over the fence. This issue never reached the English or Chinese language blogosphere or the traditional media? As far as I know.
Then story itself is two years old, but the colorful accusations put RSF in a perspective that is rather different from the way their actions are mostly framed by Western media:

Il y a déjà plusieurs années que Ménard et RSF sont arrivés à pénétrer les salles de rédaction de plusieurs médias de communications français et d’autres internationaux, déguisé en activiste des droits humains, version impérialiste, plaidant pour le droit à l’ingérence dans les affaires intérieures de chaque pays, justifiant les interventions bellicistes de ses maîtres. (Already for some year Menard and RSF have entered the editorial desks of the French and other international media, disguised as human rights activists.....)

Since then the same organization has continued its struggle against, expanding it to Bagdad and giving more details on how RSF has been financed and defended US interests. It is very hard to judge at this stage about the ongoing actions of French solidarity organizations. Her the founder of RSF, Robert Menard - at the center of the accusations, explains how RSF works and gets funded. Again, what amazes me is that this kind of stories on the relationship between the RSF and the CIA go around and have been profoundly ignored by most other media.


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