Expert Council of Europe: "On the eve of the election the greatest responsibility on the TV channels financed from the budget"

The Azerbaijani government can accelerate the adoption of the law "On defamation", especially since almost all of the neighbors have already done it - said in an interview (obyektiv.tv) expert of the Council of Europe observer Rastro Kuzhel.

He has experience in media monitoring on the territory of Azerbaijan and believes his hopes for objective coverage in the last parliamentary elections in 2010 unfulfilled. Four minutes allocated to candidates for deputies to perform on public television, have become the most transparent of the last segment of the race. News on all the TV channels covered biased, and if the policy of private broadcasters can somehow understand, is incorrect coverage state channel AzTV and the public TV, which are funded by taxpayers.

In 2010, a group of observers led by KUZHEL monitored the electronic media in Myanmar, where the situation for journalists has been worse than in Baku. According to the results of the program local government has taken a number of changes, and today the situation is radically changed because of the desire leadership. The same situation with Georgia - where the cabinet also adopted a number of amendments aimed at objectivity and transparency of reporting on elections and election campaigns. It is worse, when the government limited to declarations and recitations - European expert.

Today, the Internet plays an important role in shaping public consciousness - any citizen can go to a social network and send any information to the maximum number of consumers of the category "friends." However, neither he nor the newspaper on the level of influence can be compared with a TV that is in almost every home - says the European expert. - 17D-