More than 25 years ago, when I was in the state service for the first and last time, it sometimes happened that officials would say something, and then they’d regret what they said, so they’d call me. They’d ask me to stop the spread of that information. It seemed as though information was a ball or a rock that you could catch and send back. This confusion existed back in 1992, when there was no internet in Armenia. It is even more so the case today.
It is impossible to stop the spread of information by influencing different newspapers. The former authorities, for example, banned negative information about themselves from being said on television. Did that help them to stay in power?
Russian millionaire Ruben Tatulyan (Robson) also made his colleagues face a similar issue. He wanted to have all negative information about himself (or, at least, what he considered to be negative) removed from the internet. He used Moscow’s courts as a tool for this, and we have no information about the way they handled this case. And he used “spreading personal information” as his excuse. And because of this accusation, aravot-ru.am was banned in Russia. According to the court and to the Roskomnadzor, private details about Tatulyan were published one year ago in an article about former Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Shavarsh Kocharyan.
I must remind you of what was said about high-ranking MFA official Ruben Tatulyan in this article that Aravot is facing problems for. “We know that people need to be observed and discussed from all sides. He also plays a positive role. There is a large Armenian community in Sochi, and sometimes, problems arise in connection to the community. He often is able to solve those problems… let’s fixate on that. Regarding the issue of the advisors, he is no longer an advisor,” Shavarsh Kocharyan told reporters in an interview, and reminded that the MFA has officially stated that Tatulyan is no longer an advisor, and besides that, he was not an official advisor. This was what served as a basis for the Moscow court’s decision.
Please tell me what private details the deputy minister said about Ruben Tatulyan. It’s clear that this issue is about the confusion of the wealthy and of post-Soviet officials. They think that, through banning newspapers, they will also be able to ban any undesirable information from being spread about them, and thus they will be able to increase their credibility, authority, and honor. I do not see any politics within the court’s decision about Aravot. I only see our compatriot’s inaccurate evaluation of the situation, which stems from illusions regarding the spread of information.
I am not at all upset or angry about this. I simply want to tell Robson that he is spending his time, money, and energy on a small problem. This is a sign of internal resentment, which I hope will pass.
Aram Abrahamyan
