The specialized parliamentary committee proposes prohibiting foreign broadcasters that incite to hatred and separatism

Members of the parliamentary committee for culture, education, research, youth, sport and mass media supported, with seven votes against four, the draft law prohibiting the outlets that support separatism and send violent messages to broadcast on the territory of Moldova.

Yesterday, 24 September, the meeting of the parliamentary committee for mass media, which began about half an hour later than scheduled, was moderated by the committee’s vice-chairman Corina Fusu, MP representing the Liberal Party.

The authors of the draft law on modifying and supplementing the Broadcasting Code are MPs Valeriu Saharneanu and Ion Hadarca, representing the Liberal Reformatory Party. At the meeting, Valeriu Saharneanu announced that they had added two new articles to the draft law. One of them provides for restricting the broadcasting of foreign outlets in Moldova. “The foreign radios and televisions that promote racial hatred, chauvinism, separatism, support attempts at the sovereignty and independence of UN-recognized states, abusively cover only the official view of their own governments, practice censorship against civil society and opposition, and support violent occupation and annexation of foreign territories shall be prohibited to be rebroadcast on the territory of Moldova,” Saharneanu quoted from the draft law.

The other article proposed by liberal-reformatory MPs concerns the limitation of the number of broadcasting licenses. Valeriu Saharneanu explained: “An individual or a legal entity can hold not more than two broadcasting licenses in an administrative-territorial unit or zone, without the possibility to have exclusivity.”

The explanatory note to the document says that the initiative is intended to protect the information space of Moldova from Russian mass media, which, according to authors, broadcast propaganda, thus violating the rights of media consumers. “Today, Russian radios and televisions have triggered an unprecedented information attack intoxicating the international public opinion, including the public opinion in Moldova, by denigrating the Ukrainian people and other peoples and by promoting chauvinism at state level. Such broadcasters are incompatible with the Constitution and legislation of Moldova,” the explanatory note says.

Previously, Dinu Ciocanu, a member of the Broadcasting Coordinating Council, said at a show on Publika TV that the rebroadcasting of foreign televisions in our country should be prohibited in order to ensure state security. He drew attention to the fact that the rebroadcasting of foreign channels, especially the ones coming from the Russian Federation, through some local outlets might lead to certain interference into the coverage of the elections campaign.

The document voted by the specialized parliamentary committee is to be examined at a plenary Parliament meeting.

Source of photo: http://media.publika.md/