Greek Voice of America Silenced After Budget Cuts

The Greek Service of the Voice of America announced today that it will soon end its broadcasts, after 72 years of operation.

The final broadcast in Greece will be on Tuesday morning, August 12, via SKAI TV. The announcement came as a result of the significant budget cuts that the news agency has recently carried out.

The Greek Service was one of the original services of the Voice of America, which began broadcasting in 1942. The broadcasting service has since covered international events and developments in the USA, in relation to Greece and Cyprus.

Voice of America (VOA) is the official external broadcast institution of the United States federal government. It is one of five civilian U.S. international broadcasters working under the umbrella of the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG). VOA provides programming for broadcast on radio, TV and the internet outside of the U.S. in 43 languages. VOA produces about 1,500 hours of news and feature programming each week for an estimated global audience of 123 million people, “to promote freedom and democracy and to enhance understanding through multimedia communication of accurate, objective, and balanced news, information and other programming about America and the world to audiences overseas.”

In 1991, Voice of America (VOA) Greek Service and VOA Turkish Service received the Ipekci Peace and Friendship Prize for Communication. They were chosen “for their multifaceted and sincere cooperation in support of the Greek-Turkish rapprochement on an international level.”