Peace University Ousts Radio
Shortwave Station
Gets Eviction Notice
By Suzanna Starcevic
Tico Times Staff
sstar@ticotimes.net

With this week's padlocking of its parking lot and a notice to evacuate the building within two weeks, Radio for Peace International (RFPI) has found itself bracing for, rather than broadcasting, political struggle.

The radio has promoted international peace, news and information programs, including many from the United Nations, from the University for Peace (UPaz) campus in Ciudad Colón, 25 km west of San José, since 1987, using the land rent-free as an independent, joint project with the UN-backed university.

Although the station continues to broadcast, the padlock went on around noon Monday, trapping staffers' cars inside the parking lot until the armed UPaz guard who put it there relented and let them out.

"The university is just defending its rights to its property," said Luís Alberto Varela, the university's lawyer. "It didn't just give them two weeks to leave; they've had a year and a half."

As early as April 12, 2002, past RFPI director Debra Latham received a letter from Rector Martin Lees saying the university would be terminating the 1992 International Cooperation Agreement with RFPI's Oregon-based umbrella organization, World Peace University, Inc. The notice gave the station until July 10, 2002 to leave, amounting to a 90-day informal eviction notice - recourse provided for While no one contests the university's ownership of the land, RFPI CEO James Latham says a cloud of confusion is still swirling around the station as to why the university is trying to remove the station from its two-story building and adjacent transmitter, built through RFPI fundraising.

"When [University for Peace President] Maurice Strong first came in 1999, he said he was very happy with Radio for Peace, one of the only independently funded joint projects," said Latham.
"The last time I asked them why they were doing this, they said only they did not want us to be here, weren't able to give us the land and wanted us to leave."

UPAZ has been criticized since its creation in 1980 by the UN General Assembly as being unproductive, an image the current administration has worked to revise; it recently graduated 24 students from a 10-month Master's program (TT, June 27).

The agreement doesn't require reasons for termination, but Varela says there should be no confusion. He cites an outstanding $14,000 debt owed by Radio for Peace to the university for installation of telephone and Internet structure and illegal use of radio frequencies as reasons that have been communicated.

"It has fallen on deaf ears," he claims.

Latham says an arrangement was in place to repay the debt, incurred in 2001, in the form of cash or radio time for UPaz, but that the radio wasn't given time to provide the services in kind.
All attempts to contact other University for Peace representatives were refused and directed to Varela.

Although an inquiry into the Radio for Peace use of frequencies listed past unauthorized use of FM frequencies, the report lists no complaints after Strong's review of the university's relationship with RFPI began. Also, UPaz initially arranged the broadcasting frequencies, some of which did not require permits at the time.

According to Latham, the shortwave bands the radio is using, 7445 and 15040, are international, registered with the High Frequency Coordination Committee (HFCC), which coordinates frequencies over the world, and open to broadcasters as long as they test for 90 days to make sure they are not interfering. The bands are used by several other broadcasters as well.

The National Radio Control disagrees, maintaining the two bands are registered for sole use by mobile aeronautic and mo-bile land communications. Melvin Murillo, director of National Radio Control, agreed that Radio for Peace had taken the steps necessary to register its frequencies with the HFCC, and the mistake was made in the go-ahead.

However, he says that upon receipt of a UPAZ letter "revoking" the station's protection (the university holds mission status and is considered international territory), he considers the radio to be under Costa Rican jurisdiction. To get "legal," the station would have to pay Radio Control ¢2,500 ($6.25) per year to test and then use a frequency.

He says he has been trying to notify the radio of this for a year and a half, but that it was impossible to find the phone number (which is listed on the RFPI Web site and also in local directory assistance.)

Varela says the university had offered to negotiate compensation for the buildings, and keep open future joint projects once the radio had resettled, but that Radio for Peace would negotiate only to stay.

Latham's response is that the RFPI board, which consists of members who live around the world, meets only once a year, and it was impossible to negotiate compensation terms without consultation.

Arcelio Hernández, lawyer for RFPI, says principles are going to be the radio's defense in future legal action.

"The radio entered the premises under an agreement," he says, noting that former Costa Rican President Rodrigo Carazo was one of the founding members of the University for Peace who extended the invitation to the radio in 1985 and is still active on the station's board, as well as President Emeritus of UPAZ. "And it remains that its most recent actions, sending an armed guard to lock the gates so people can't get their cars out, are hostile acts, and don't coincide with the ideas of peace."

He says there are legal eviction procedures, and that the university has not used them. Also, RFPI has invested roughly up to $725,000 in the infrastructure, far less than half of which would be transferable to another location, he says.

He plans to meet with board members Saturday to plan the defense carefully, and accompany it with a campaign for policy change in the university.

Ex-President Carazo will also be at this meeting, and says he couldn't make detailed comments until speaking with the Board. He did forcefully say he was in "utter disagreement" with the university's actions.

"They haven't given real reasons for eviction," Hernández says. "We could be looking at repression of freedom of the press."

Varela says that's nonsense, and that a letter from the university to Foreign Minister Roberto Tovar stating that the "current activities of RFPI are inconsistent with the international emphasis currently being developed by the university" wasn't a reference to programming, but to the irregularities in frequency operation.

"These things came up in other administrations," he said. "They just decided to focus attention elsewhere."

Robert Muller, a UPAZ co-founder and the university's Chancellor Emeritus, said he was saddened by the actions.

"My ideal was that the University for Peace, Earth Council and Radio for Peace would be the beginning of a new Athens on the hills there, and together be able to give hope to new generations," he said.

At 80, Muller is still active in promoting peace, but acknowledges he no longer has influence in decisions made at the university.

"I have heard that people at the university have said radio doesn't have a place," he said. "I think it's very important for a developing country."

A tired Latham emphasized Tuesday night that the radio bears no ill will towards the university.

"We would just like to see this resolved in a win-win situation," he said. "We're all supposed to be working for peace; there's more than enough to do, and enough room for all of us to do it."

On Saturday morning Radio for Peace will hold an information event outside the locked gates at 9:30 a.m. For more info, call 249-1821.

RFPI members and volunteers are urging people to writing to Kofi Annan, Secretary General of the United Nations (annan@un.org) or contribute with checks marked for Legal Defense Fund, sent to Radio For Peace International, P.O. Box 3165, Newberg, Oregon, 97132.