Head of the Armenian Delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) Arpine Hovhannisyan on Thursday delivered a speech on behalf of European People's Party (EPP) at the debate on the political influence on independent media and journalists.
In her speech, she noted, in particular: ''We have yet much to do in this sphere. There are also issues which need attention and solution. I especially mean the online media. If in case of press and TV and radio companies the procedures for the publication of the data ensuring the transparency of the real owners of media and media activity are relatively certain [...], I think this situation is different with online media.
The report justly refers to the research conducted by Access Info. I would like to stress that the research carried out in 20 countries, including EU countries, show that only four countries have legislative regulations on the transparency of online media. In fact, the research shows that despite the existence of legislative regulations, the proposed procedures are not effective and do not ensure the real transparency of online media. This means that regardless of how progressive our ideas are, we will have no framework to implement them.''
Referring to the methods of revealing the real owners of online media, Hovhannisyan pointed out to special regulations, direct disclosure of information to public, and a law on companies.
''But it should be noted that the selection of one of these methis gets quite complicated in case of online media.
''The experience in both Armenia and other countries shows that in case of online media it is very often impossible to find out who is behind the website.
I think we should use this platform to find such balanced mechanisms, which will allow each reader to understand who the source of the given news feed is. Otherwise, media diversity will be out of the question, and the rights, for the insurance whereof the CoE member states and CoE have been exerting efforts for already several decades, can immediately turn into seeming rights,'' Hovhannisyan said.
