As the 1990s opened the Communist Bloc across Europe was crumbling away.
No one yet suspected it would end up collapsing all the way to Moscow though.
Everyone was interested in where the Iron Curtain would disolve next and how the Soviets would react.
With that in mind.. SBS Television in Australia began screening the Soviet Nightly News "Vremya" DIRECT from Moscow every day.
It was a move that would ultimately lead to "Worldwatch" later in the 1990s with SBS expanding the service to include a variety of different News Bulletins from different countries being screened here unedited and as they aired in their home countries.
But in 1990.. this was a FIRST and ironically "Vremya" (meaning TIME in Russian) would continue to be screened up to and during the Coup in August 1991.
"Vremya" first went to air on Soviet TV in 1964 but as a consequence of the Coup and its close association with the Communist Regime it was cancelled in 1991.
However it remerged as THE Nightly Newscast again on Russia's Channel One with the same name in 1996 and continues today.
This particular edition of "Vremya" screened on SBS TV in Australia in October 1990.
The only ODD thing I can't work out is that according to the SBS Test Card information at the start, this broadcast aired at 1pm in the afternoon on the East Coast of Australia.. when it was 7am in Moscow.. so it couldn't be "LIVE" as "Vremya" would air at 9pm at night.
The only way it could be LIVE is if this went to air at 1am in Australia and "Vremya" was airing 2 hours earlier at 7pm.. but that's unlikely.
COMICAL NOTE: The Music underscoring the SBS Test Card was later used extensively in the 1997 Movie "Austin Powers".
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