YEREVAN PRESS CLUB WEEKLY NEWSLETTER
NOVEMBER 17-23, 2006
HIGHLIGHTS:
"PRESS-CLUB+": PPA DISCUSSING POVERTY REDUCTION AND EUROPEAN INTEGRATION
YPC MEDIA MONITORING: EUROPEAN NEIGHBOURHOOD POLICY AND MILLENNIUM CHALLENGE
ACCOUNT RECEIVE LITTLE COVERAGE WITH NO NEGATIVISM
DIGITAL BROADCASTING: PROS AND CONS
"PRESS-CLUB+": PPA DISCUSSING POVERTY REDUCTION AND EUROPEAN INTEGRATION
On November 21 the twenty-second talk show of "Press Club+" series went on
the evening air of "Yerkir-Media" TV company.
The invitees of the program host, the Chief Editor of "Aravot" daily Aram
Abrahamian were the leaders of People’s Party of Armenia as guests, and NGO
and media representatives as experts. The TV discussion focused on poverty
reduction and European integration of Armenia.
It is expected that at 21.00, November 28 (next Tuesday) "Yerkir-Media" will
air another "Press Club" show where the representatives of media will share
their opinions on the issues of the day.
YPC MEDIA MONITORING: EUROPEAN NEIGHBOURHOOD POLICY AND MILLENNIUM CHALLENGE
ACCOUNT RECEIVE LITTLE COVERAGE WITH NO NEGATIVISM
On October 1-31, 2006 Yerevan Press Club monitored the coverage by Armenian
media of European Neighbourhood Policy and Millennium Challenge Account. The
monitoring was implemented under YPC project "Supporting Freedom and Quality
of Journalism and Directing Media Towards Urgent Issues", supported by the
Open Society Institute. The study aimed at gaining and analyzing
quantitative data to determine the attention of Armenian media to European
Neighbourhood Policy and Millennium Challenge Account that Armenia is
involved in, including specific directions/priorities of both programs.
Monitoring covered:
4 TV companies – nationwide Public Television of Armenia (PTA First Channel)
and "Armenia", covering whole or significant part of Armenia, "Yerkir-Media"
and "Shant" TV companies in Yerevan.
6 national newspapers – official "Hayastani Hanrapetutiun" and "Aravot",
"Azg", "Haikakan Zhamanak", "Hayots Ashkhar", (dailies); Russian-language
"Golos Armenii" (three times a week).
Monitoring objects were: all publications of newspapers above, the main
newscasts, news and analysis programs, and commenting programs of the TV
companies above, containing any references to European Neighbourhood Policy
and Millennium Challenge Account.
Monitoring conclusions:
1. News coverage at TV channels. The news coverage on TV channels that were
monitored displayed extremely low attention to European Neighbourhood Policy
and Millennium Challenge Account. The PTA First Channel allocated 3.2% of
the total number of pieces in news/news and analysis programs to the
subject; "Armenia" – 2.7%; "Yerkir-Media" – 2.6%; "Shant" – 1.3%. Overall,
of all 1,897 pieces studied in news/news and analysis programs 48 (or 2.5%)
were dealing with the subject: 17 – in full, 31 – partly. Most of this
coverage refers to European Neighbourhood Policy – 38 pieces (14 – in full,
24 – partly), whereas the Millennium Challenge Account was made a reference
to only in 10 pieces (3 fully dealing with the subject, 7 – partly dealing
with it). None of the issues of the weekly news and analysis programs "360
Degrees"/"Sunday Hailur" (PTA First Channel) and "Sunday Horizon" ("Shant")
never addressed ENP and MCA, and the "Horizon" newscast ("Shant") and the
news and analysis program "Yerkragund" ("Yerkir-Media") in October only
mentioned the European Neighbourhood Policy. The references to both ENP and
MCA were in the pieces of the news and analysis program "Express"/"IT
Express" and the weekly sum-up "Sunday Express" ("Armenia") as well as in
the main newscasts of "Hailur" (PTA First Channel), "Zham" (Armenia) and
"Yerkirn Aysor" ("Yerkir-Media").
In the vast majority of cases the coverage of ENP and MCA was due to
official events (speeches of the Armenian leadership, meetings with
representatives of other countries, European Union, etc.)
"European Neighbourhood Policy" was in the camera focus due to a number of
events in October, primarily, the visit of European Union representatives to
Yerevan – Minister of Foreign Affairs of Finland Erkki Tuomioja, Minister of
State of Germany Gunter Gloser, the Head of European Commission Delegation
in Armenia and Georgia Ambassador Torben Holtze, the end of negotiations on
Action Plan for Armenia; the meetings of the RA President Robert Kocharian
with Torben Holtze, the President of Romania Traian Basescu, the heads of
diplomatic missions of EU member countries, where, among other issues the
ENP was discussed; the session of RA-EU Cooperation Committee held in
Brussels and the related press-conference of the RA Minister of Trade and
Economic Development Karen Chshmaritian.
The pieces had a purely reporting, general nature, they told nearly nothing
about the specific directions (the Action Plan priorities), with the
exception of the cases when the report characters noted the directions
themselves in a certain context. Hence, less than 10 references were made to
issues of regional cooperation (Armenia-Azerbaijan-Georgia), twice the
energy system reform was mentioned, in particular, the issue of Metsamor
NPP, and once – the Mountainous Karabagh conflict resolution process.
The events prompting the coverage of the Millennium Challenge Account in
October were, first of fall, the meetings of the RA Prime Minister Andranik
Margarian with the OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairman Matthew Bryza, the Prime
Minister of Belarus Sergey Sidorskiy, as well as the working sessions held
under the MCA. No MCA specific directions were mentioned in the pieces.
2. Connotation of the TV channel news coverage. It is most noteworthy that
the pieces containing references to European Neighbourhood Policy and
Millennium Challenge Account were never negative in connotation. In other
words, these programs were mentioned either in neutral (32 references) or in
positive (16) context. The European Neighbourhood Policy received 24 neutral
and 14 positive references; the Millennium Challenge Account received 8
neutral and 2 positive ones. While "Hailur" newscast of the PTA First
Channel and the news/news and analysis programs of "Yerkir-Media" mostly
retained neutral tone, the proportion of positive and neutral references in
the news/news and analysis programs of "Armenia" TV and in "Horizon"
newscast of "Shant" TV had a greater share of positive references (8 to 6
and 3 to 1, respectively). The positive connotation of pieces was due
primarily to the fact it quoted opinions, statements of Armenia and foreign
representatives, assessing ENP and MCA favorably.
3. Commenting programs. The commenting programs "Fifth Wheel" (PTA First
Channel) and "Perspective" ("Shant") monitored did not address the
Millennium Challenge Account and European Neighbourhood Policy at all. The
latter was only mentioned in the commenting programs of "Yerkir-Media" TV –
in the issue of "European Diary" and the issue of "Window" cycle that was
launched in October, when a film of European Commission Delegation in
Armenia on ENP was shown. Today "Yerkir-Media" is the only major Armenian TV
channels that has permanent awareness raising programs on issues of European
integration.
4. Print media coverage. As compared to the news coverage on TV channels,
the newspapers studied displayed even smaller interest to European
Neighbourhood Policy and Millennium Challenge Account. Except "Hayastani
Hanrapetutiun" that allocated 3.7% of the total number of pieces to the
programs, the newspapers did not refer to the subject even in 1% of the
publications: "Hayots Ashkhar" and "Golos Armenii" – 0.7% each, "Haikakan
Zhamanak" – 0.5%, "Azg" – 0.4%, "Aravot" – 0.2%. Thus, of 4,670 newspaper
pieces monitored, only 50 (or 1.1%) were dealing with European Neighbourhood
Policy and Millennium Challenge Account: 13 – in full, 37 – partly. Most of
these publications (32) appeared on the pages of "Hayastani Hanrapetutiun".
Similarly to the TV channels, the coverage in the newspapers focused on
European Neighbourhood Policy – 37 pieces (8 – fully dealing with the
subject, 29 – partly dealing with it), whereas Millennium Challenge Account
was referred to only in 13 publications (5 fully dealing with the subject, 8
– partly dealing with it). MCA, however, was never mentioned in "Azg".
Similarly to the TV channels, print media mostly addressed ENP and MCA in
case of official pretexts; such were the events of October as listed above.
The publications were mostly reports of general nature, did not mention the
specific directions of the programs, but for "Hayastani Hanrapetutiun", who
gave a broader presentation of specific directions/priorities of ENP Action
Plan, in contrast to other media studied. Overall, 5 references were made to
the issues of regional cooperation and implementation of the program in
other countries of the region (Georgia, Azerbaijan) each; 2 – to the process
of Mountainous Karabagh resolution. Other directions of European
Neighbourhood Policy, besides those noted, were only covered in publications
of "Hayastani Hanrapetutiun": "Strengthening of human rights and fundamental
freedoms, including freedom of expression and freedom of assembly" (4);
"Economic growth and poverty reduction", "Rule of law and approximation of
legislation with European standards" (2 each); "Improvement of election
system and elimination of fraud", "Policy implementation in other countries
and in general" (1 each).
As to Millennium Challenge Account, of all directions of the program two
references were made to "Development or regional communication networks
(primarily, rehabilitation of regional/rural roads") and once each – "Loans
to farmers", "Involvement of civil society (in general)", "Improvement of
irrigation system".
5. Connotation of newspaper coverage. Similarly to the TV channels studied,
the newspaper coverage of European Neighbourhood Policy and Millennium
Challenge Account were either neutral (42 references), or positive (8).
Positive references were made for European Neighbourhood Policy only:
positive assessment was given in quotations of officials and in only two
articles the positive context was conveyed by the authors themselves.
YPC Report on Monitoring Armenian Media Coverage of European Neighbourhood
Policy and Millennium Challenge Account can be viewed at in
"Studies" section.
DIGITAL BROADCASTING: PROS AND CONS
On December 22 at "Congress" hotel in Yerevan the draft program for
introducing digital TV and radio broadcasting in Armenia was discussed. The
event was organized by OSCE Office in Yerevan, Office of the OSCE
Representative on Freedom of the Media, and Open Society Institute
Assistance Foundation-Armenia in partnership with the RA Ministry of
Transportation and Communication. The discussion opened with speeches by RA
Deputy Minister of Transportation and Communication Vruyr Arakelian, Head of
OSCE Office in Yerevan Ambassador Vladimir Pryakhin, the Advisor of OSCE
Representative on Freedom of the Media Ana Karlsreiter.
The head of "TV and Radio Networks of Armenia" CJSC of the Ministry of
Transportation and Communication Ashot Simonian presented the draft program
on introducing digital broadcasting in the country. The document was
developed by an interdepartmental task force headed by Vruyr Arakelian upon
the commission of the RA Government.
Experts shared their opinions on the draft, too: Professor of Law at
universities in Estonia and Sweden Katrin Nyman Metcalf; head of Center for
Information Law and Policy, member of Information Technology Development
Support Council David Sandukhchian (Armenia); security and political analyst
Richard Giragosian (Washington, USA). In the opinion of experts, the
introduction of digital TV and radio broadcasting will be generally a
progressive development for Armenia. At the same time it was noted that the
draft program proposed has a number of serious deficiencies and omissions.
In particular, the draft stipulates to stop the licensing of analogue
broadcasting as of January 2007. This may result in a situation when during
the upcoming years the analogue TV and radio channels will cease from
existing and the digital ones will not have come into being yet. Besides,
the concept of "social package" is introduced, that is, subsidizing the
economically vulnerable groups to get a minimal set of TV programming –
public and private. The Government is to decide which of the private
broadcasters will be included into the package. This is a violation of
independent broadcasting principles. Such decisions should be made solely by
an independent regulatory body and not by the Government. It is also unclear
how the rights of consumers with regard to program content and diversity
will be ensured. The draft program also calls for significant budget
investment into state transmitting company, possibly creating a misbalance
between it and private transmission operators and resulting in a monopoly of
telecommunications market. In other words, these and other provisions of the
draft generally contradict the principles of fair market competition – in
terms of both budget investment and regulation, state policy in
telecommunications sector.
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Press Club is required.
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Editor of YPC Newsletter – Elina POGHOSBEKIAN
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Yerevan Press Club
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0002, Yerevan, Armenia
Tel.: (+ 374 10) 53 00 67; 53 35 41; 53 76 62
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From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress
