Millions Turn to VOA for Impactful Coverage of Latest Developments in Ukraine War
VOA’s impactful reporting on the new financial, humanitarian and military assistance to Ukraine announced this week garnered millions of views and interactions on social media. VOA Russian and Ukrainian Services’ live, on-the-scene coverage featured interactives with Ukrainian TV channels, expert analysis, Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal’s visit to Washington and simultaneous translation of President Biden’s subsequent speech announcing additional aid to Ukraine, the IMF conference, a U.S. program to admit Ukrainian refugees, U.S. diaspora initiatives in support of Ukraine, and interviews with local Ukrainian officials, Ukrainian immigrants in the U.S. and American volunteers. VOA Russian’s documentary The Role of A Soldier based on the Service’s extensive interview with LA Times Russian journalist Sergei Loiko was versioned and released on VOA+ and YouTube and was among the most popular videos on the VOA Russian website.
VOA's Fact Check Website Experiences Increased Audience Engagement
The News Center’s Polygraph.info website has published 60 fact checks since March 1, and page views have more than doubled for the same period. In terms of engaged minutes, March was the site’s best month to date, with April results likely to top that. An article on the vaccines and the pandemic by William Echols in collaboration with VOA Mandarin reporter Mingmin Xuan has 105,000 views. Another fact-check video by Nik Yarst hit 26,000 views on YouTube. Polygraph.info also collaborated with the Latin America Division on its Verificado page and is exploring a similar relationship with the Persian Division.
VOA Kurdish Launches Five-Day TV Program on 30th Anniversary
VOA’s Kurdish service celebrated a landmark anniversary with the launch of a five-day TV show, Kurd Connection. The program targeting Kurdish-speaking audiences in Iraq, Syria, Turkey, and Iran will be airing from Sunday through Thursday each week by Nalia Radio and Television (NRT), an influential Kurdish TV channel based in Iraqi Kurdistan. "I congratulate VOA Kurdish on its 30th anniversary," said Sirwan Rojbayani, Deputy Governor of Iraq's Nineveh Province. "I hope you continue your coverage of events in Iraq, Kurdistan and the world in an objective way, as you have done so in the past."
VOA Mandarin’s Coverage of Shanghai Lockdown Resonates with Audiences
As China continued its draconian zero-covid lockdown in Shanghai, Mandarin’s reporting scored big on social media. An interview with a US-based health expert alone generated 111,000 Twitter views. Yanzhong Huang questioned the double digit death figure in a city with over 400,000 cases. He acknowledged relaxing rules would trigger a surge in China’s large populations not exposed to the virus. To get out of the lockdown cycle, he said Beijing must improve vaccine effectiveness, stock up therapeutics and build resilience to Covid and protect those most vulnerable.
VOA Hausa Ramps Up Coverage Ahead of 2023 Nigerian General Elections
The Hausa service has begun coverage of the upcoming 2023 General Elections in Nigeria, to be held on February 25, 2023, with interviews of leading political figures. During his interview with the service, leading PDP party member Governor Aminu Tambuwal declared he was not going to be a candidate for President. The video received more than 140K video views and 4,400 engagement actions. The chairman of the rival APC party, Abdullahi Adamu, was also interviewed. The video received more than 120K video views and 3,000 engagement actions.
VOA Persian Covers the World Bank-IMF Summit in D.C. and Hamid Nouri Trial in Stockholm
VOA Persian aired a special program on the World Bank-IMF summit which garnered 24,000 views in IGTV. Host Payam Yazdian interviewed Saeed Ghasseminejad and Sara Bazoobandi about Iran’s Minister of Economy cancelling his visit and the state of Iran’s economy. Afshar Sigarchi reported on the agenda of the World Bank-IMF summit. Audience engagement spiked in response to Hamideh Aramideh’s exclusive report on the Hamid Nouri trial from Sweden garnering an Instagram reach of 104,260 and 24,000 views on YouTube. Audience engagement on these special reports surpassed 784,800.
VOA Spanish Coverage of Regional Migration Conference Attracts Media Partner Interest
VOA produced multimedia content and provided an average of 100 live shots for affiliates during two days of coverage of the ministerial conference attended by U.S. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken and Health and Human Services Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas. The interest of affiliates on this subject has increased greatly, due to potential changes of U.S. immigration policy, as well as concerns about the possibility of increases in the number of migrants trying to cross the border. The United States detained more than 221,000 people at the border with Mexico in March, the highest number in a single month in more than two decades.
VOA Programming Highlights are compiled based on information available from multiple sources at the time of posting. This information constantly evolves. If you intend to cite to information posted in VOA Highlights, please consult VOA Public Relations at publicrelations@voanews.com to ensure it is accurate and current.