Identity Statement

Reference Code

HU OSA 350-4

Title

Middle East

Date(s)

1980 - 2002

Description Level

Subfonds

Extent and medium (processed)

217 BetaSP NTSC, 6.51 linear meters
1 BetaSP PAL, 0.03 linear meters

Content and Structure

Scope and Content (Abstract)

The Middle East collection contains 218 raw and edited videos, including amateur footage, documentaries, event recordings, home movies, live broadcast, media briefings, news reports, oral history interviews, talk shows, testimonies, and war reports, documenting the political and social turmoil in the Middle East from 1980 till 2002.

The collection covers extensively the Persian Gulf War (the invasion of Kuwait by Iraqi troops, the U.N.-authorized war waged against Iraq, the liberation of Kuwait) and the situation of the Kurds in the 1980s and 1990s (Iran–Iraq War, Al-Anfal Campaign, Kurdish uprising, Kurdish exodus). A significant part of the collection consists of news reports and television broadcast by US, UK and Canadian media (ABC, CBS, CBC, CNN, NBC, PBS), as well as a large number of documentaries. To a lesser degree, the collection touches upon issues that emerged in post-Soviet Afghanistan, the situation of the Palestinians since 1948, the consequences of the Arab-Israeli war, the Iranian Revolution of 1979, the Lebanese civil war, and the political situation in Turkey.

The collection includes rare recordings of the genocide committed against the Iraqi Kurds, as well as well-documented reports about Saddam Hussein’s regime, testimonies of victims of torture, and Iraqi state television propaganda. It also features important footage recorded with hidden cameras documenting abuses, torture, and executions in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Accruals

Not Expected

Conditions of Access and Use

Conditions governing access

Open to public.

Conditions governing reproduction

Copyrights are held by creators/producers (no rights are held by OSA at CEU).

Languages

Afghan Persian, Dari, Arabic, Azerbaijani, Bosnian, Danish, English, French, German, Hebrew, Italian, Japanese, Kurdish, Persian, Pushto; Pashto, Serbian, Spanish; Castilian, Turkish

Physical characteristics and technical requirements

Footage recorded on Beta Sp NTSC/PAL tapes.

Description Control

Archivist's note

Processed by Anna Kövecsi and Alexandra Lăzău-Ratz, December, 2010 – January, 2011; revised by Anna Kövecsi and Csaba Szilágyi, May, 2011.