ArmInfo.The report of Volodymyr Ariev (Ukraine, EPP/CD). "Attacks against journalists and media freedom in Europe", which mentions Nagorno Karabakh as a territory of Azerbaijan and which expresses concern about the media freedom problems "on that territory", caused the indignation of the Armenian Delegation to PACE.
In particular, lawmaker Naira Karapetyan said: "In the paragraph 9 of this document there is a statement that has nothing to do with the reality. The rapporteur is sure that ''the protection of media freedom under Article 10 of the European Convention of Human Rights (ETS No. 5) is also absent in other territories of member States'' meaning the conflict areas, including Nagorno-Karabakh. The rapporteur didn't even familiarize himself with the Human Rights watchdog statistics including Freedom House reports, where freedom of media in Nagorno-Karabakh is recognized as partly free. That record is much better than Azerbaijani data. The rapporteur ignores these facts even after being provided with the proper information, even more - he was absolutely closed for any kind of cooperation. He didn't request any information about the area he refers on, surprisingly stopped receiving emails and phone calls after we asked him to rely not only to Azerbaijani propaganda."
"By the way, during this 4-day-war, as it was called later, a great number of key international media visited Nagorno-Karabakh - only on 1-8 April there were 68 journalists, 37 media organizations, and later about 100 journalists joined them, having broadcasts from the exact places of armed operations. I may name them - CNN, RAI, Al Jazeera, New York Times, Lifenews, Medusa etc. Many of you may remember the life interviews with Foreign Affairs Minister of Nagorno-Karabakh Republic on CNN. Is it proves that there is no freedom of media in this area? No, it proves quite the opposite," Karapetyan said.
Another member of the Armenian Delegation, Naira Zohrabyan, said that the Ukrainian lawmaker had better speak of the media problems in his own country - about the violence and even murder of journalists, mass hindrance to their professional activities, closure of certain "unfavorable media outlets". "Instead, Ariev spoke of the Karabakh problems. The impression is that he intentionally referred to Karabakh only to name it a territory of Azerbaijan, and the NKR authorities as a separatist regime," Zohrabyan said.
To note, at a session on Tuesday, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) rejected the Armenian Delegation's proposal to revise Paragraph 9 of the Resolution "Attacks against journalists and media freedom in Europe" based on the report by Volodymyr Ariev (Ukraine, EPP/CD). The paragraph says that PACE expresses its concern over the fact that the media freedom stipulated by Article 10 of the European Convention of Human Rights is missing in the territories of the member states, which are "de facto controlled by the separatist regime". Particularly, the matter concerns "Nagorno- Karabakh - in Azerbaijan, Abkhazia and South Ossetia - in Georgia, Transnistria - in Moldova". The Armenian Delegation suggested replacing the names of the territories with a phrasing "conflict zones."