Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty’s programs to Latvia and six other East European countries will end Dec. 31, the U.S. government-funded broadcaster has announced from its headquarters in Prague in the Czech Republic.

But Baltic lobbyists, who have appealed continuously to the federal government to restore funding, are not ready to give up their fight while an omnibus appropriations bill remains under discussion in Congress.

The U.S. Senate may take up a conference committee’s report on the appropriations bill on Dec. 9. The bill includes USD $546 million for the Broadcasting Board of Governors, the Washington, D.C.-based agency that oversees RFERL, Voice of America and other U.S.-funded international broadcasters.

RFERL President Thomas Dine announced the pending end-of-the-year closure to his staff in Prague on Nov. 28, according to a press release from the broadcaster. In addition to Latvia, broadcasts to Bulgaria, Croatia, Estonia, Lithuania, Romania and Slovakia also will cease “under a directive from the White House and the Broadcasting Board of Governors,” the press release said.

VOA broadcasts to Latvia also are expected to end, although a broadcasting board spokesperson declined to comment. “We won’t have any statement about languages until after Congress passes a bill and it is signed into law by the president,” Joan Mower told Latvians Online.

The end to the broadcasts, which will mean the loss of jobs for more than 100 journalists and other staff, is the result of shifting priorities within the Bush Administration. The White House’s proposed fiscal 2004 budget called for cutting broadcast services to those countries—including Latvia—scheduled to join the NATO defense alliance and the European Union, using the money saved to bolster new programs to the Middle East.

“Over the last six years, RFERL has rapidly expanded its operations in Eurasia and Southwest Asia,” Dine said in the press release. “It is now time to focus fully on these very troubled areas.”

When news of the proposed cuts first broke in January, Baltic-American lobbyists and government leaders in the Baltics tried to convince the White House and Congress to save the broadcasts. The Joint Baltic American National Committee, for example, expressed “profound alarm” at the threatened end of both RFERL and VOA broadcasts and what it could mean for U.S. efforts at public diplomacy in Europe.

In addition to continuing their appeals to members of Congress, supporters of broadcasts to the Baltic states are now trying to raise public awareness. Among their efforts are contacting conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh and a call-in show on the C-SPAN cable television channel.

Funding for American broadcasts overseas falls under the Foreign Operations budget, which has now become part of HR2673, the Consolidated Appropriations bill approved Nov. 25 by a House-Senate conference committee. Both the House and the Senate have yet to agree to the conference committee’s report.

On a visit to Bulgaria, Latvian President Vaira Vīķe-Freiberga opened an honorary consulate in the capital city of Sofia and named Alexander Dimitrov-Popov as the honorary consul, according to the president’s press office.

Latvia does not have an embassy in Bulgaria. Rather, diplomatic relations are handled by Ambassodor Uldis Vītoliņš, Latvia’s ambassador in Poland.

Dimitrov-Popov heads up one of Bulgaria’s leading law firms, Popov & Partner, according to the LETA news agency.

In addition to opening the honorary consulate, Vīķe-Freiberga during her visit also met with Bulgarian President Georgi Parvanov and spoke to the Atlantic Club in Sofia. Vīķe-Freiberga’s trip to Bulgaria was the first ever by a Latvian head of state.

A performance by the Kronos Quartet of Latvian composer Pēteris Vasks’ “String Quartet No. 4” is among recordings nominated for a Grammy Award, the Recording Academy has announced in Los Angeles.

The performance, released in August on a compact disc single, is one of three by the Kronos Quartet featuring work by three internationally known composers, according to quartet’s recording company, Nonesuch Records. The compositions were commissioned to celebrate the Kronos Quartet’s 30th anniversary. Vasks’ “String Quartet No. 4,” according to Nonesuch, “somberly reflects on the passing of the last century.”

The Kronos Quartet was nominated twice this year for Best Chamber Music Performance, once for the Vasks composition and once for its performance of Austrian composer Alban Berg’s “Lyric Suite,” which features the soprano Dawn Upshaw.

Others nominated in the category are Michael Cox, Nicholas Daniel and the Maggini Quarter for “String Quartet No. 1” by Arthur Bliss; Speculum Musicae for “Oboe Quartet” by Elliott Carter, and Boris Berman and the Vermeer Quartet for their performances of piano quintets by Dmitry Shostakovich and Alfred Schnittke.

The Kronos Quartet, formed in 1973 in Seattle but now based in San Francisco, consists of Jennifer Culp on cello, Hank Dutt on viola, David Harrington on violin and John Sherba on violin.

In other Baltics-related Grammy nominations, two recordings involving Estonian choirs are up for awards for Best Choral Performance. Conductor Paul Hillier is nominated for his work on Baltic Voices 1, featuring the Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir and the Tallinn Chamber Orchestra. Conductor Paavo Jarvi and chorus masters Tiia-Ester Loitme and Ants Soots are nominated for Sibelius: Cantatas, which features the Ellerhein Girls’ Choir, the Estonian National Male Choir and Estonian National Symphony Orchestra.

Robina G. Young is nominated for Classical Producer of the Year for her work on several recordings including Baltic Voices 1 and The Powers Of Heaven, both of which feature Hillier conducting the Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir.

Winners of the Grammy Awards will be announced Feb. 8. —Andris Straumanis