The topic of “Aravot” online on the air is discussed between the President of “Asparez” club Levon Barseghyan and media expert Samvel Martirosyan.
Aram Abrahamyan – Now the most relevant issues, of course, are the prime minister’s appointment, constitutional amendments, and the non-government quartet or trio. But do you know what I am thinking? If Armenia is not an independent country, is it important what Constitution we will have, or who our prime minister and the president will be?
Levon Barseghyan – No, of course. The supreme value is the sovereign state, in my measurements. Today, they were already talking about the possible assimilation of the monetary unit. If the supreme value is missing, the rest becomes phony.
A. A. – In other words, can we say that the theme on broadcasting Russian channels, however, is relevant to our society, and our viewers.
Samvel Martirosyan – The problem is that these channels, until they started “fiddling around”, have always been a part of our daily lives, the matter is more that they were like an unconscious background, and now an attempts is made to display a conscious approach. It is necessary or not?
A. A. – I would like just to remind you that the Armenian National Platform of the Eastern Partnership Civil Society has raised the issue of Russian “Rossia 1” and “1st channel”, which according to the interstate agreement, are broadcast in our country. It is noted that the content of these channels is contrary to our Constitution, the Law on Television and Radio, as well as the European conventions, because they instill xenophobia and national hostility while covering the events in Ukraine. Do you watch these channels?
L. B. – I watch them because of my work, and not only these channels, also “Moscow 24” and “Russia 24”. The matter was discussed in the expert circles, still far ahead of Ukraine, at the time when the “A1+” was banned to be on air. It was said that if Armenia has a frequency which by the intergovernmental treaty can be released to another country to broadcast the TV programs, it would be better to continue broadcasting them by the satellite, and allow this frequency is enter into a tender, and let a TV channel win it, or resume the right of “A1+” at least thereby. Naturally, the government was not ready for such things, moreover, especially now when a “September 3” has occurred, and under the background of neo-colonization, it is a major tool to create a background in the consciousness of a citizen or resident of Armenia.
A. A. – The opponents of this statement say, and what about the CNN and Euronews, should we also ban them?
L. B. – No, I’m more inclined to pluralism, and the matter is that the statement contains inter-ethnic hostility, discriminative attitude and aggressive propaganda. If CNN contains such a thing, there should be a similar claim.
A. A. – Do we provide some frequency to CNN or Euronews for broadcasting?
S. M. – Euronews goes by the frequency of “Armnews”. And, CNN, I assume it is available.
L. B. – These transmissions or retransmissions are two different groups. One group is those, which are based on interstate agreements. CNN is commercial, and is a local broadcaster, which broadcasts programs. This statement does not speak about Russian radio channels, which began broadcasting in our country surprisingly, which, of course, do not contain the aggression that we see in the transmissions of two well-known Russian TV channels.
A. A. – However, I would like to say that no matter how the CNN is rebroadcast, it would not particularly affect. There are not so many people knowing English than Russian in Armenia.
S. M. – In addition, they are different – CNN differs from the Russian “1st channel”, because it shows also movies, entertainment programs and so on, whereas CNN – only news. If “Russia Today” was broadcast in Armenia, we could compare, but the comparison here is hard.
A. A – Do we calculate how many people in Armenia are watching TV at all? How many people are watching this controversial channels? And, how many people in general are not watching at all? Everything is taken from the Internet, which, of course, is much more diverse.
S. M. – I think it’s is hard to give a definite answer, because, on the one hand, no matter how many people say they they do not watch TV, however, in many families, it’s enough to have a grandfather to watch and this background mode is continuously working for all, including when Yevgeny Kiselyov is constantly screaming. The internet should not also be overestimated, in other words, the visitors to online news sites, there are also segments here, let’s say, most of the visitors read about accidents, suicides, in short, non-political related materials.
A. A. – Don’t they read about Ukrainian?
S. M. – They read something, but I assure you, the experience shows that if people are reading, many of them are reading inattentively. There is such a Facebook effect, a memory loss, you can post the same video 5 days later and say that the event has taken place at the very moment, and people begin to share it again. In other words, it’s a little experiment, which shows that people can be easily cheated. Kessab event were a very striking example, when the Armenian media finally came to their senses, and began writing that Armenians are not killed in Kessab, but the Russian media influence was so strong that to this day many people believe that Armenians were killed in Kessab.
Prepared by ARAM ABRAHAMYAN
“Face to Face” talk show is released by the Open Society Foundations-Armenia. This views and analyzes found in this program express the opinions of the participants, and are not approved by the Open Society Foundations-Armenia, or its Board. This program is made possible thanks to the comprehensive financial support by the Open Society Foundations-Armenia, under the mass media support program, gran
