Caption for photo above: Pictured from left to right Hovhannes Movsisyan Nikol Pashinyan, Armen Sarkissian, and Armen Grigoryan
The Media Ethics Monitoring Body has established a violation of the ethical code by the Public Television and Radio Company of Armenia (PTA) in the reports that were aired on Channel One on May 24 and June 6 and concerned the people of Artsakh.
In its conclusion, the monitoring body notes that the requirement to respect privacy was violated during the broadcast of the information (the voices of those accused of crimes were broadcast without changes), and negative stereotypes were disseminated against people of Artsakh origin.
“In addition, the TV channel did not delete numerous comments containing insults, promoting incitement to hatred, violence and other actions prohibited by law. The clause of the regulations that requires photographs accompanying the material to be true was also violated,” the conclusion of the Media Ethics Monitoring Body of Armenia says.
At the same time, the conclusion notes that the acting director of the Public Television Company, Hovhannes Movsisyan, in an explanation to the Monitoring Body, stated that the TV channel “broadcast official messages received from the Investigative Committee (IC)”.
In this regard, the Monitoring Body emphasized that the broadcast of the official message of the Investigative Committee by Public Television does not exempt it from observing the norms of journalistic ethics. Let us recall that the former Artsakh Ombudsman and head of the public organization “Union “Artsakh” Artak Beglaryan appealed to the Monitoring Body with a request to study the reports aired by PTA. In these reports, as Beglaryan noted, information was distorted, hatred was incited against the people of Artsakh, and excessive attention was focused on the Artsakh origin of the alleged criminals.
The question is the reports prepared by PTA regarding the detention of former heads of communities in Nagorno-Karabakh and the alleged participation of Artsakh residents in opposition rallies for money.
