Radio France Internationale (rfi)

Radio France Internationale generally referred to by its acronym RFI, is a French public radio service that broadcasts in Paris and all over the world. RFI broadcasts 24 hours per day across the world in French and in 12 other languages in FM, shortwave, medium wave, cable, on Worldspace and on rfi.fr. It is a channel of the state company, France Médias Monde (RFI – France24 – MCD).

RFI was created in 1975 as part of Radio France by the Government of France, and replaced a private station which was commandeered by the Germans during the occupation of France, and the Voice of France which was operated by the Vichy regime from 1941 to 1944, RTF Radio Paris (1945) and ORTF Radio Paris (1965). In 1986 the French Parliament changed the law to allow RFI to operate independently of Radio France.

RFI operates under the auspices and primary budget of the French Minister of Foreign Affairs. It also owns Monte Carlo Doualiya (formerly Radio Monte Carlo Middle East), which produces Arabic programmes in Paris, and airs them from a transmitter in Cyprus to audiences across the Middle East and North Africa.

Some 34.5 million listeners around the world tune into RFI every week (weekly audience without extrapolation) and its new media platforms attract 8 million visits a month.