HE DOES NOT MIX SEPARATE CASES OF CRUELTY WITH MASS ACCIDENTS

Lragir.am
21 June 06

Miklos Haraszti, OSCE Representative on Freedom of the Media, in
Yerevan for a two-day visit, stated June 21 that recently no cases of
violence or physical assault against journalists have been reported
in Armenia. He said it is very important because the evaluation of
the rights of journalists and absence of self-critique is based on
this. His statement that there is no violence aroused laughter among
journalists, and they reminded Haraszti that two years ago on April
5 bodyguards broke a camera, on April 12 the police beat several
journalists, then in Tsaghkadzor the photographers taking pictures
of the villas of government officials and oligarchs were attacked by
bodyguards. Miklos Haraszti says he knows separate cases and he does
not mean that there is no violence at all. He means that there are
no systematic and mass accidents involving journalists.

By the way, Miklos Haraszti also wondered why the government, accused
by the majority of Armenian journalists of violation of the freedom
of media, does not apply the article on libel, which provides for
accountability of journalists. Being against this article, Miklos
Haraszti, nevertheless, wanted to know why it is not applied by the
government if it is against freedom of speech. Discerning an assertion
in the words of Miklos Haraszti that the government of Armenia is not
up for violation of freedom of the media, otherwise they would use the
article on libel, we will make an attempt at explaining Mr. Haraszti
why the article on libel is not applied in Armenia. This article is
not applied for the simple reason that it is impossible to libel the
government of Armenia, for whatever is written is true. But there
is another, a more forceful reason for not applying this article. By
applying this article the government will, in fact, create a precedent
of application of law in Armenia. And in order to prevent a precedent
of application of law, the government is ready to bear libel.