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SOURCE PROTECTION: COURT ORDER RAISES CONCERNS ON RIGHTS OF MEDIA TO PROTECT SOURCES
News | 15.07.14 | 15:50
By Sara Khojoyan
ArmeniaNow reporter
A ruling by an Armenian court forcing a newspaper to reveal a source
has raised questions about media rights and freedom.
On June 26 the court forced Hraparak daily and ilur.am website
to reveal the source of their information about a police officer's
illegal actions addressed to wrestler Artur Aleksanyan and his brother
Rafayel Aseksanyan.
Hraparak daily's editor in chief Armine Ohanyan on July 15 at a
discussion session in Media Center said that the court's decision
is a new, unprecedented method the attorney general decided to apply
against the media.
"During the recent months notices, demands, visits to the newsroom have
increased. Every week our reporters are called to an interrogation,
every day we receive a notice about revealing the source," Ohanyan
mentioned.
Human Rights defender, Rule of Law NGO member Artak Zeylanyan is
assured that the decision is an illegal judicial act, because "the
court acted as a non-law-based institution."
"We turned to the appeals court with a complaint and we will defend
this right that is everybody's right."
"This case cannot anyhow be investigated upon regulations of criminal
trials, not even upon regulations of civil trials, this is solely
a subject of public discussion of legal relationships," the lawyer
mentioned.
The first deputy of Armenian Human Rights Defender Genya Petrosyan
said the demands on the newspaper and website are a means of aiding
a police investigation and that in doing so the court threatens a
right to defend the information source.
"Moreover, it might result in eliminating the media's possibility of
receiving information, which we consider very dangerous for freedom
of press in our country," Petrosyan emphasized.
According to the Armenian Ombudsman's office, as a European Council
member country Armenia must not go against precedential legal acts
adopted by them, where it clearly states cases where the source was
supposed to be revealed.
"It must be unambiguously determined that all alternative means of
clarifying the information are depleted, it must also be determined
that there is more public interest out of revealing, rather than of
not revealing the information," Petrosyan said adding that with the
existence of all this, the court has only three conditions upon which
the source can be revealed - for protecting human life, for preventing
a grave crime from happening or for realizing the protection of a
person having committed a grave crime.
Zeynalyan specified that "the source must be revealed not for
investigating a grave criminal case, rather for (to prevent) protecting
the person having committed the crime."
http://armenianow.com/news/56072/media_law_in_armenia_ombudsman_office_european_cou ncil
News | 15.07.14 | 15:50
By Sara Khojoyan
ArmeniaNow reporter
A ruling by an Armenian court forcing a newspaper to reveal a source
has raised questions about media rights and freedom.
On June 26 the court forced Hraparak daily and ilur.am website
to reveal the source of their information about a police officer's
illegal actions addressed to wrestler Artur Aleksanyan and his brother
Rafayel Aseksanyan.
Hraparak daily's editor in chief Armine Ohanyan on July 15 at a
discussion session in Media Center said that the court's decision
is a new, unprecedented method the attorney general decided to apply
against the media.
"During the recent months notices, demands, visits to the newsroom have
increased. Every week our reporters are called to an interrogation,
every day we receive a notice about revealing the source," Ohanyan
mentioned.
Human Rights defender, Rule of Law NGO member Artak Zeylanyan is
assured that the decision is an illegal judicial act, because "the
court acted as a non-law-based institution."
"We turned to the appeals court with a complaint and we will defend
this right that is everybody's right."
"This case cannot anyhow be investigated upon regulations of criminal
trials, not even upon regulations of civil trials, this is solely
a subject of public discussion of legal relationships," the lawyer
mentioned.
The first deputy of Armenian Human Rights Defender Genya Petrosyan
said the demands on the newspaper and website are a means of aiding
a police investigation and that in doing so the court threatens a
right to defend the information source.
"Moreover, it might result in eliminating the media's possibility of
receiving information, which we consider very dangerous for freedom
of press in our country," Petrosyan emphasized.
According to the Armenian Ombudsman's office, as a European Council
member country Armenia must not go against precedential legal acts
adopted by them, where it clearly states cases where the source was
supposed to be revealed.
"It must be unambiguously determined that all alternative means of
clarifying the information are depleted, it must also be determined
that there is more public interest out of revealing, rather than of
not revealing the information," Petrosyan said adding that with the
existence of all this, the court has only three conditions upon which
the source can be revealed - for protecting human life, for preventing
a grave crime from happening or for realizing the protection of a
person having committed a grave crime.
Zeynalyan specified that "the source must be revealed not for
investigating a grave criminal case, rather for (to prevent) protecting
the person having committed the crime."
http://armenianow.com/news/56072/media_law_in_armenia_ombudsman_office_european_cou ncil