"AUTHORITIES SHOULD TAKE STEPS IN DIRECTION OF SETTLING UNFAVOURABLE
SITUATION EXISTING IN SPHERE OF MASS MEDIA," YEREVAN PRESS CLUB AND TIM
DECLARE

YEREVAN, DECEMBER 27, NOYAN TAPAN. The Yerevan Press Club and the TIM
research center call to the authorities of Armenia for not looking for
the reason for the criticism voiced in their address by international
organizations in the monitoring of mass media. This was said in the
December 26 joint statement of the Yerevan Press Club and the TIM
research center. It is mentioned that the monitoring reflects the
unfavourable situation existing in the sphere of mass media, for the
settlement of which the authorities should take steps.

According to the authors of the statement, during the meeting with
Peter Semneby, the European Union Special Representative for South
Caucasus, Serge Sargsian, the Prime Minister of the Republic of
Armenia, estimated the information, which "European officials" take as
basis, about the state of the Armenian mass media on the eve of the
2008 presidential elections as not objective and suggested "renting a
specialized organization", which will conduct a complete monitoring,
observing both electronic and printed mass media.

The Yerevan Press Club and the TIM research center propose European
structures to conduct an expert examination of the results and
technology of the monitoring being conducted by them within the
observation frameworks of the presidential elections of the Republic of
Armenia, as well as to conduct a parallel monitoring of mass media by
the authorized international organization of the structures observing
the elections.

By limiting themselves to the monitoring of mass media at this stage,
the TIM and Yerevan Press Club have been led by the circumstance,
according to which media being broadcast, in difference to the printed
ones, bear certain obligations for the impartiality of coverage in
front of society by using public resource (frequency). The activities
of the broadcast mass media are taken out a patent and are controlled
by a special regulating body, that is to say, by the National
Commission of Television and Radio, whereas, patent and special
regulation of printed media are not envisaged by the legislation.

"The work conducted by the TV and Radio companies during the elections,
and the level of their objectivity directly characterize to what extent
the state performs the political obligations assumed by itself in front
of its international parters. It should be assumed that this very
circumstance was the basis of the opinion of Peter Semneby, the
European Union Special Representative for South Caucasus, worthy of the
regular discontented interpretation of the official Yerevan concerning
the obligation of the authorities for the pre-electoral key of mass
media," is mentioned in the statement of the Yerevan Press Club and TIM
research center.