GALA TO FILE A LAWSUIT WITH EUROPEAN COURT

Aravot
Dec 23 2008
Armenia

The hearing on the dispute over the TV tower between the Gyumri
municipality and GALA TV resumed yesterday [22 December] at Shirak
Region Court of General Jurisdiction.

The Gyumri mayor, under the instruction of the authorities, had decided
to take the TV station off air by taking away the TV tower that had
no owner. The mayor privatized it hastily and then sued the GALA TV,
demanding to vacate the TV tower. Judge Armen Khachatryan ruled
in favour of the municipality. International bodies got engaged;
as a result, the Armenian Court of Cassations on 31 October had to
satisfy GALA’s appeal and send the case back to the Shirak Region
Court of General Jurisdiction. GALA representative Karen Tumanyan
told us yesterday that the Court of Cassations, considering that the
sides were in unequal positions, had instructed the Shirak Region
Court of General Jurisdiction to satisfy GALA’s moves of conducting
constructional-technical tests. "The test will determine whether GALA’s
coverage would be of the same quality and size if the equipment is
removed from the TV tower and installed at a different place. This
time we managed to bring the court processes to a democratic field. At
the past trial sessions, the court was trying to swiftly disconnect
GALA’s cable, there was no justice."

Besides the TV tower problem, GALA had filed an appeal with the
Court of Cassations against the State Tax Service which had "drawn"
a debt of 26,899,955 drams (about 87,000 dollars) for the TV company
before starting an inspection; it was paid by Gyumri residents with
the help of a telethon. We asked GALA’s representative to explain at
what stage is the appeal. It turned out that the Court of Cassations
has returned the appeal without a clear explanation. "We are planning
to file a lawsuit with the European Court on the basis of articles 10
and 6. The mistakes made by the Court of First Instance are already
substantiated because the individuals who had testified against the
TV company were not interrogated, meaning that we were not given an
opportunity to ask questions to the persons who had testified that
they had paid GALA for commercials. I don’t know if such people exist
at all. This is a breach of Article 6 of the Human Rights Convention:
everybody has the right to ask questions to those who had submitted
accusatory information to law enforcement agencies against him,"
Tumanyan says.

The municipality’s attorney did not appear in court today, and the
court recessed until 14 January 2009.