English channel set for Al Jazeera

Al Jazeera, the Arabic news network, yesterday announced that its English-language television news channel, Al Jazeera International, will debut Nov. 15.

The rollout will mark the world’s first English-language news channel based in the Middle East. The channel’s first broadcast will originate from Al Jazeera’s headquarters in Doha, Qatar, at 7 a.m. EST.

Al Jazeera International “will provide a fresh approach to news and current affairs” with “a combination of 12 hours of live news plus interview programs and in-depth features and analysis from the world’s hot spots,” the company said.

Al Jazeera, famously denounced as a propaganda organ by Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, was the subject of a 2004 documentary, “Control Room,” that examined the network’s coverage of the war in Iraq.

The new channel boasts broadcast centers in Doha; Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia; London; and Washington. The D.C. bureau features Viviana Hurtado, a CNN Espanol veteran, and former CNBC Washington correspondent Rob Reynolds.

Al Jazeera International “offers the chance to reach out to a new audience that is used to hearing the name ‘Al Jazeera’ without being able to watch it or understand its language,” said Wadah Khanfar, the network’s director-general.

France, not to be outdone, announced yesterday that it will roll out a round-the-clock international news channel in December to challenge the “Anglo-Saxon” views of market leaders CNN and BBC. “France 24” will broadcast in both French and English.

No word yet on what kind of seat assignment its Washington correspondent can expect at White House briefings.

‘Fair Game’

Public radio is no longer just for baby boomers and news junkies, it turns out.

WETA 91.9 FM on Friday will join nearly a dozen other public radio stations in debuting “Fair Game from PRI with Faith Salie,” a one-hour weekday evening broadcast that host Ms. Salie describes as the radio “love child” of “The Daily Show with Jon Stewart” and “The Tonight Show with Jay Leno.”

“What we share with ‘The Daily Show’ is an inclination to reach out to younger listeners and an irreverent, skeptical take on hard news,” said Ms. Salie, a comedienne who previously starred on Bravo’s improvisational sitcom, “Significant Others.”

“Unlike ‘The Daily Show,’ we don’t just cover politics. We like to think of it as the evolution of the variety show.”

“Fair Game” will feature interviews with newsmakers and celebrities, along with musical and comedic performances. Field correspondents will also contribute to the program, tackling, in Ms. Salie’s words, “such weighty issues” as the Miss Adams Morgan Pageant, an annual drag-queen event in Northwest.

“There’s also a lot of unscripted, spontaneous interaction with random phone-call recipients,” Ms. Salie added.

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