Epress.am News from Armenia
The Armenian media is on the border of moving from “partly free” to “not free”, according to the findings of a sociological study carried out by the Committee for the Protection of Freedom of Speech, Aug.–Sept. 2010. The study was carried out in order to determine the level of freedom that Armenian media possess, taking into account the influence of legal, political, and economic factors.
Presenting the findings to journalists today, Freedom of Speech NGO President Ashot Melikyan and sociologist Vardan Grigoryan noted that 50 experts took part in the survey, including independent experts, as well as directors of media agencies and members of the press.
The questions and analysis were based on the methodology of the international organization Freedom House, where countries are given a total score from 0 (best) to 100 (worst) on the basis of a set of 23 methodology questions and 109 indicators divided into three categories: the legal environment, the political environment and the economic environment. The degree to which each country permits the free flow of news and information determines the classification of its media as “Free,” “Partly Free,” or “Not Free.” Countries scoring 0 to 30 are regarded as having “Free” media; 31 to 60, “Partly Free” media; and 61 to 100, “Not Free” media.
The level of freedom of Armenia’s media with respect to the legal environment was given a score of 15.25 points, which, according to the logic of Freedom House’s methodology, is an average indicator.
With respect to the political environment, the findings indicated that the freedom of Armenian media was greater at 22.88 points, while in the economic environment, it was 20.51 points. The level of freedom for Armenian media was given a total score of 58.68 — that is, very close to being considered “not free.”
Armenian media is considered economically “not free,” according to Melikyan and Grigoryan.
“Why is that, because many news agencies cannot come out from under this burden, and unable to be self-sustainable, rely on different types of support and sponsorships. That’s what provoked news agencies to make such assessments of their activities. There is also much disappointment in a political sense,” said Melikyan, explaining that news agencies feel the influence of this or that political party or group and their observations are related to political views.