Cyfra Plus

"Cyfra+" is a Polish digital satellite platform. It offers 600 radio and TV channels. 40 of these are dedicated for Polish audience. The remaining ones are free-to-air from Hot Bird and Astra satellites. Due to the availability of original sound tracks, Cyfra+ is an excellent TV platform for foreigners who stay in Poland, as well as for students of languages.

English language offer includes:

• 4 major news channels (BBC World, CNN, EuroNews, CNBC)(Fox News was cancelled on Aug 1, 2003)
• 6 movie channels (two HBO channels, two Canal+ channels, Hallmark and TCM)
• 6 educational channels (4 Discovery channels, National Geographic and Animal Planet)
• BBC Prime and BBC Learning
• Bloomberg and CNBC
• Eurosport
• Cartoon Networks (and TCM)
• religious channels
• TVN24 news from Poland in English 20:30 CET (15 minutes)

The offer includes multiple radio channels, original Polish TV channels, TV channels from throughout Europe, Asia and Middle East, and more. By June 2003, Cyfra+ had 1.5 million subscribers (twice as many as in the same time of 2002).

Interestingly, During Gulf War 2, coverage was available from Al Jhazeera, Fox News, multiple Arabic channels as well as ... official Saddam channel: Iraqi TV that went off the air during one of the bombing raids.