FRANCAISReporters sans frontières - Comments
4) The financial resources
-The annual reports distributed to the general public do not give a detailed account of the operations carried out by RSF. Since 2003, the organization publishes the financial resources of RSF-France and RSF-International in a single account. The data of AidWatch for the years 2001 and 2002 were thus combined by adding the figures of the two structures.
-In order to guarantee its financial independence, RSF favours selling by-products like photo albums. It benefits from corporate sponsorship and receives subsidies from private foundations as well. However, the organization is also funded by local authorities (the General Council of Hérault, the Regional Council of Languedoc-Roussillon), the French government and the European Union. Thanks to the latter, the budget of RSF strongly increased from 1993 on.
-The funding from organisms directly linked to the American government earned RSF some criticisms for relaying the interests of the United States through the cooperation agency USAID (United States Agency for International Development) and the secret services of the CIA (Central Intelligence Agency). The association recognized having accepted subsidies from the NED (National Endowment for Democracy), a Republican foundation created by President Ronald Reagan and “one of the many bogus institutions used by the CIA to intervene in the home affairs of foreign countries” according to Maxime Vivas. The latter also criticized RSF for receiving funds from the CFC (Center for a Free Cuba) since 2002, “one of the organizations subsidized by the NED and USAID to overthrow the Cuban government”. Last but not least, the French NGO got funds from the Open Society Institute of the American multimillionaire George Soros, accused by Maxime Vivas of intending to set up pro-Western governments everywhere in the world.
-Other controversies plagued the association. During an auction sale organized in 2004, RSF thus received funding from Omar Harfouch, a Lebanese businessman close to Colonel Mouammar Kadhafi in Libya, a country where press freedom is not respected.
