New US station to start beaming to Iran.

[Ydun M. Ritz]

The United States plans to start beaming new Farsi radio broadcasts to Iran next month, hoping a mix of pop songs and hard news may help make unpopular U.S. policies a bit more palatable to young Iranians.
Radio Farda -- 'tomorrow' in Farsi -- is expected to offer at least five hours of news, features and other programming spliced into a mix of popular Persian and Western music from the likes of Britney Spears and New Kids on the Block.
The broadcasts, due to begin in mid-December, are the latest salvo in a U.S. campaign of "public diplomacy" aimed at presenting U.S. policies, culture and institutions in a better light in the Middle East following the Sept. 11 attacks.
By Arshad Mohammed, Reuters website (20/11-2002) where you can see all the article.

Does anybody have information about frequencies??
Thanks.

[Mika Mäkeläinen]

Radio Farda has now begun broadcasting - or at least testing - it was first logged today by Paul Ormandy in NZ. For more info, check out http://www.dxing.info/news/index.dx#farda

Currently (at 0825 UTC) I'm listening to Radio Farda on 9585, 15290 and 17675 kHz. This will soon end, and the next transmission is scheduled to start at 1400. I still picked up also Radio Azadi on 17675 kHz this morning at 0730 UTC, so it seems that the transfer over to Radio Farda is not yet complete - or they just used a wrong feed.

Here is the schedule of Radio Azadi, which should now become Radio Farda:

FA RFE RL12 0430 0830 KAV 04 15290 095
FA RFE RL12 0430 0600 KAV 02 12015 112
FA RFE RL12 0430 0830 LAM 06 9585 096
FA RFE RL12 0600 0730 KAV 02 17675 100
FA RFE RL12 0730 0830 MOR 01 17675 075
FA RFE RL12 1400 1700 WOF 04 15410 105
FA RFE RL12 1400 1500 LAM 03 11730 108
FA RFE RL12 1400 1700 KAV 08 9435 104
FA RFE RL12 1500 1700 LAM 03 11730 108
FA RFE RL12 1900 2100 BIB 06 11985 105
FA RFE RL12 1900 2000 KAV 08 11960 095
FA RFE RL12 1900 2000 DB 07 6140 264
FA RFE RL12 2000 2100 UDO 07 11960 300
FA RFE RL12 2000 2100 UDO 03 9785 300
FA RFE RL14 2000 2300 MOR 05 9835 035
FA RFE RL14 2000 2300 MOR 10 7165 019

The full BBG schedule can be found at http://sds.his.com:4000/fmds_w/schedule ... ngsked.txt

In the DXing.info Audio section under USA at http://www.dxing.info/audio/index_usa.dx you can also find sample station identifications of Radio Farda and Radio Azadi.

[Gaines Johnson]

Reference "Radio Farda"

Does anybody have information about frequencies??

On Medium Wave it is on 1593 kHz from Kuwait with a power of 150 kW. I would be interested in any reports on this particular frequency because I just spent three months in Kuwait installing that transmitter (smile). It is an old Continental 318.5D series working into a two tower 1/4 wavelength array.

[Teemu Juurinen]

Heard today R Farda on 1593 kHz at 2055 UTC with western pop music. ID at 2100 followed by short news flash. Good signal and clear audio.

73's
TEJ
Palstar R30
Wellbrook ALA-100

[Gaines Johnson]

Heard today R Farda on 1593 kHz at 2055 UTC with western pop music. ID at 2100 followed by short news flash. Good signal and clear audio.

Thanks for the signal report. The transmitter in Kuwait is using an Orban Digital Optimod limiter/processor. There is another medium wave transmitter with only 60 kW on 1539 (I think) at Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates.
Gaines

[Jean Burnell]

Gaines,

This transmitter on 1593 kHz has even been heard in North America. We heard this from the coast of Newfoundland on November 5th and 6th during a DXpedition. The signal was fairly strong but it was getting chewed up by interference from Romania, Ireland and Egypt. It was interesting that the MW signal was a couple of seconds ahead of the parallel programming on 9680 kHz.

BTW, I'm trying to get a DXpedition summary ready for DXing.info in the near future.

Jean Burnell
Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada

[Mika Mäkeläinen]

Heard Radio Farda on May 18 after 2300 UTC on 1170 kHz. This is said to come from Dabiya, United Arab Emirates. Does anyone know the power of the transmitter? Is it something new or a move from another fq?