Free?: International press monitors say Armenia has shown “unprecedented” progress in media freedom; locals disagree
00:00, October 30, 2007 | Freedom of Information and SpeechDespite the fact that the prestigious human rights watchdog Freedom House this year ranked Armenia among countries with “not free” media, and where freedom of speech is regressing, another international organization is attempting to draw a different picture.
Reporters Without Borders (often referred to in French as Reporters sans Frontieres and abbreviated RSF due to being headquartered in Paris) is a non-profit organization that has consultant status at the United Nations. Based on its daily press releases, fact-finding mission reports and regular publications, the organization stages several annual events to highlight the issue of press freedom.
Unlike 2006, this year the media watchdog has registered “unprecedented” progress in press freedom and freedom of speech in Armenia.
According to the organization’s Worldwide Press Freedom Index 2007, Armenia is ranked 77th with an index of 23.63 among 169 countries reviewed, near such countries as Kenya, Haiti and Congo.
According to the same report, last year Armenia was in 101st place among 168 countries.
The best press freedom index was registered in Iceland, Norway and Estonia. The United Kingdom is 24th (8.25), and the Unites States is 48th (14.50).
Turkmenistan, North Korea and Eritrea are at the bottom of the list having rolled back their free press and speech.
Armenia’s neighbor Georgia is in the 66th position with an index of 20.83.
“There is an improvement to some extent in Armenia and Georgia,” RSF director for Europe and the former Soviet Union Elsa Vidal said in an interview with RFE/RL.
The organization’s representative noted, however, that the same cannot be said about Azerbaijan where journalists have been subjected to persecution over the past year.
“Fabricated charges were brought against several of them at the time when they published articles not desirable for the authorities,” Vidal said. “That explains why Azerbaijan is considered to have one of the worst press freedom indexes.”
Azerbaijan is 139th in the rating list. Iran is 166th and Russia is 144th. The organization registered regression also in Turkey.
According to the report, Turkey’s rollback is conditioned also by the murder by a radical nationalist of Armenian Hrant Dink, editor of the Agos newspaper.
This year Turkey is 101st with an index of 31.25 – in contrast to Armenia’s leap.
“We see certain improvement in Armenia and Georgia, especially in terms of making information available for the public,” Vidal said.
However, this improvement is “not obvious” for Armenia’s organizations dealing with free speech and human rights issues, which periodically conduct studies in this field.
“It is at least abnormality to ascribe such progress to Armenia,” Artur Sakunts, head of the regional branch of the Armenian Helsinki Citizens’ Assembly in Vanadzor, said. “How can information be considered available in Armenia? How can they speak about the availability of public information in the case when during this year’s parliamentary elections all television companies were controlled by the government?”
Sakunts says that the researches regularly conducted by his organization show that violence and threats against journalists have not stopped.
Press monitoring coordinator at the Yerevan Press Club Elina Poghosbekyan also agrees that nothing has happened in Armenia over the past year for such a huge progress to be registered.
“We have no explanation as to on what basis the organization has registered such ‘progress’,” Poghosbekyan says. “Reporters Without Borders do not comment on the freedom of press situation in Armenia in any way. In other words, the journalistic community of Armenia continues to remain unaware what prompts such drastic ups and downs in its rank, particularly this time, when Armenia gained the highest line ever, going up by 25 ranks as compared to the 2005 and 2006 RSF index.”
According to specialists, the 2007 freedom of speech report by Freedom House gives a certain idea of the situation in Armenia. On the three-color ‘freedom gauging’ map of countries in that report Armenia is painted in purple.
According to Armenian Helsinki Committee Chairman Avetik Ishkhanyan, purple means absence of free speech. Ishkhanyan says Armenia has shown regression in the area of media freedom for the past five years.
By Marianna Grigoryan