BBC to Launch Al-Jazeera Competitor The British Broadcasting Corp. said Thursday it will launch a 24-hour Arabic-language TV news channel to compete with the Qatar-based satellite station Al-Jazeera The channel will be broadcast across the Middle East and Europe. The new channel's $50 million in annual costs will be covered by the Foreign Office, which also provides funding for the BBC World Service's radio network. The BBC is hoping to rival Al-Jazeera, which has aired many of Osama bin Laden (news - web sites)'s speeches and has been accused of anti-Western bias. "After discussions about the changing media scene in the Middle East, and in the light of the growing impact of regional satellite TV services in Arabic, the Foreign and Commonwealth Office asked the BBC World Service to develop a proposition for a BBC Arabic television service," the BBC said.
