ERBIL, Iraqi Kurdistan – A new radio station that broadcasts to refugees in the Kurdistan region is facing the reality that most of its target audience doesn't own radios at the moment. Radio Al-Salam, which started airing from Erbil on April 5, aims to provide news and entertainment for the 1.5 million refugees and internally displaced people (IDPs) that have flooded the region. “It's a way to make bridges between the communities,” said spokesman Vincent Gelot, a 27-year-old French national. “Each camp is living a little bit in their bubble so [the station is] a platform for dialogue.” Broadcasting news, weather, music and even horoscopes, the station – whose name means peace in Arabic – aims to make daily life a bit easier for its audience. The station originally planned to employ IDPs and refugees but discovered that finding employees who could commit long-term positions was a challenge. “They don't want to stay,” said Gelots, explaining that their first two employees soon left to emigrate. “But our small team reflects the diversity of the refugees.” On a recent morning at the studio, presenters Fabian Noel and Sevin Ebrahim were reading the weather in Arabic. Noel, a 35-year-old Assyrian Iraqi, has previous radio experience. Ebrahim is learning on the job, however, and the 24-year-old half-Syrian half-Russian is a little flustered. Their morning guest is Lavin Putrus, the communications officer for the Catholic charity Caritas. It's her first time speaking on the radio and she, too, is a little nervous. Noel interviews her about the work Caritas is doing in the region, with Putrus keen to highlight that they provide assistance on the basis of need. “We don't want them to think we only target Christians,” she said. Likewise, Radio Al-Salam hopes to appeal to all IDPs and refugees. “Here, you don't have only displaced Christians, you have displaced Yezidis and Muslims,” said Gelot. “We didn't want to focus on one [group], we wanted to focus on all of them.” As they switch between segments, the French radio journalist overseeing the broadcast waves at Ebrahim to turn her microphone down. “At first I was a little bit confused but then I remembered,” Ebrahim said of her first morning using the sound mixer. “You have to make mistakes to learn,” the French journalist said. Now would be that time, as the nascent radio is yet to build an audience. “In the camps they don't have radios,” said Gelot. “So one of our first goals now will be to give radios.” So far, Radio Al-Salam has distributed 250 radios as a pilot program to test reactions to their early broadcasts. Down the road from the studio, IDPs living in a half-finished building were among the first to receive radios. Al-Amal Centre is an informal IDP camp of 140 families, mostly from Qaraqosh. The residents fled from Iraq's Christian capital and are living in prefabricated cabins installed on the different floors of the building. Camp manager Watheq Ghanem Majeed, a 35-year-old engineer from Qaraqosh, said the radios were gratefully received “because people want something to listen to during the day.” Janan Tobia, a 50-year-old school manager, said the radios are useful because they have a built-in light and a USB slot, but concedes that he still mostly watches television. Satellite dishes sprouting from the building's skeleton suggest that most of his neighbors are also TV viewers. Housewife Rafeda said she still watches television but her 12-year-old son Bassem had taken the radio to the building's unfinished lobby to listen to music. Her neighbour Khalida Nasser said she listens to the radio regularly. She enjoys the news but wishes that they would broadcast Christian sermons, like the radio station in Qaraqosh used to do. “We like to listen to Mass in the morning,” she said. Gelot concedes that building the audience will be a long-term project. “We need to build trust,” he said. “We want to be their voice.”
