The U.S. State Department is buying ad time on Pakistani TV to show messages from President Barack Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton distancing the U.S. from an anti-Muslim movie clip that incited violence in the Middle East.
Nuland |
State Dept. spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said in a press briefing Thursday that the government has spent about $70K to buy time on about seven stations in Pakistan to show clips of speeches by the two top U.S. officials in the wake of widespread condemnation of the film, “The Innocence of Muslims.”
Large protests in Islamabad against the film and U.S. this week, some of which turned violent, involved tens of thousands of people. U.S. consulates in Lahore, Karachi, and Peshawar were closed, although the embassy in Islamabad remained open.
“As you know, after the video came out, there was concern in lots of bodies politic, including Pakistan, as to whether this represented the views of the U.S. government,” said Nuland. “So in order to ensure we reached the largest number of Pakistanis – some 90 million, as I understand it in this case with these spots – it was the judgment that this was the best way to do it.”
In one ad, Clinton directly addresses the anti-Muslim film. “Let me state very clearly that the United States has absolutely nothing to do with this video,” Clinton says, according to Nuland. “We absolutely reject its contents.”
In another ad, Obama says the U.S. has been a “nation of respect” since its founding “that respects all faiths.” He adds, “We reject all efforts to denigrate the religious beliefs of others.”
The ads, which are subtitled in Urdu, carry the U.S. seal and carry notice that the message was paid.
Nuland said the U.S. has bought ad time in a “select group of other countries” at other times in the past “when you’re working in a media environment where this kind of purchase of public service announcements is the norm for getting your message out.”
“I think the sense was that this particular aspect of the president and the secretary’s message needed to be heard by more Pakistanis than had heard it, and that this was an effective way to get that message out,” she said.