PROGRAM NOTES 06/26/09- This weeks show features stories from China Radio International, Radio Netherlands, Radio Havana Cuba, and the Voice of Russia

From CHINA- China and the US are going to meet to discuss US military spying on Chinese territory, arms sales to Taiwan, and the North Korea situation. All schools in a region of China are closing for a week because of the H1N1 virus outbreak. Somalia has declared a state of emergency due to increasing battles with insurgents. Iran has lashed out at foreign media and Western governments for spreading anarchy and vandalism. Japanese whalers unloaded their first catch of the season, a week before the International Whaling Commission meets in Portugal.

From NETHERLANDS- Radio Netherlands has eliminated SW broadcasts to North America. The decision is based on their surveys that find very few listeners in N America. If you ever listen to RN on shortwave please let them know- by email to letters@rnw.nl or send them a letter to RNW Worldwide, PO Box 222, 1200JG, Hilversum, The Netherlands.

Iceland has been expanding their hunt of fin whales, which they will have to cease to join the European Union. French President Sarkosy wants a ban on women wearing burkas. An analysis of the potential voter fraud in the recent election in Iran. Newspapers are struggling everywhere in the internet age- what do the Dutch think of this? An Israeli human rights organization has supplied Palestinians with video cameras to document war crimes- they just received the One World Media award for their work.

From CUBA- The Israeli Defense Minister has authorized 300 new homes in the occupied West Bank. The Iraqi government is preparing to sell off large oil contracts for the first time since 1972. At least 60 people attending a funeral in Pakistan have been killed by US military drones. The US administration has rejected a United Nations panel call for a 40% reduction of greenhouse gas emissions by 2020. Cuban journalists have called on the mass media in the US to report honestly on the case of the Cuban 5. Several well-known Americans have expressed outrage at the refusal of the US Supreme Court to review the case of the Cuban 5.

From RUSSIA- The US and Russia will meet next month to restore strategic arms reduction, but the press secretary of the US State Department said that the US plans for a missile defense shield will not be discussed.

--"Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. This is not a way of life at all in any true sense. Under the clouds of war, it is humanity hanging on a cross of iron."
--Dwight D Eisenhower