Media, OSCE criticizes new law

The objections are technical and essential. For example, article no. 35 that directly affects news broadcasts, imposes obligations seemingly right for the newsrooms, such as “true and impartial broadcasts”, by not expressing the political point of views of the newsroom; the obligation of dedicating an obligatory broadcasting time to the news, which must not damage the dignity, the human and basic rights of the people; or the obligation of not allowing broadcasted programs to damage the public moral and ethics.

OSCE raises the question if this law is able to widely regulate media ethics, or if it would be better for ethics to be regulated by the media itself.

On the article which states that the news should be real and impartial, OSCE raises the question of who determines what is real and impartial.

As for the obligation to dedicate to news not less than 20% of the broadcasting hours from 07:00 to 19:00, except for the cases when the National Council of Radio and Television provides otherwise, OSCE has made a calculation in their question:
20% is equal to 12 minutes per hour, a time that is not fulfilled even by BBC. Isn’t this a severe intervention in the editorial policies and the program of a media?

Are programs of special interest (such as music channels, who might like to operate without news) obliged to broadcast news? What connection are there between this clause with article no.70 of license revocation, and article no.130 that imposes sanctions?

In fact, article no.35 of this draft-law is one of most commented articles in OSCE objections.

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