Indeed, the participants of the round-table have agreed that people living in Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan are in the least bit interested in lives of their neighbors, considering the fact that the three countries are situated close to one another. Nevertheless, neither they were able to form a united economic space nor a united political system. To make matters worse, all these countries have got different international policy. For instance, Georgia tends to join European Union, whereas Armenia is interested in building stronger relations with Russia. Azerbaijan, in its turn, tends to keep its independence avoiding the influence of both Europe and Russia. Azerbaijan perceives its cooperation with the East and the West in terms of power supply only.
The interest of each country in the South Caucasus has been revealed during the debates. The Armenians are interested in ethnic Armenians who represent 90% of population in the region of Javakheti in Georgia. Georgia is scarcely keen on the inner processes of the neighboring countries. However, Georgia is slightly more interested in Azerbaijan since gas and oil supply go through Georgia from there. Azerbaijan shows an interest in Georgia only due to projects concerning power supply.
Armenia and Azerbaijan show a great interest in each other due to Karabakh conflict.
The head of NGO “Caucasus Center of Peace-making Initiatives”, George Vanyan, claims that even during the conflict between Russia and Georgia Armenia was more interested in the reaction of Azerbaijan officials: “Due to Karabakh conflict we always keep a track of publications concerning Azerbaijan reaction. A vast majority of people were interested what Ilkham Aliev’s reaction would have been if Saakashvili had won the war.”
According to the head of youth movement “Dalga” and editor-in-chief of the “Alma” newspaper, Vafa Jafarova, Azeri people feared the threat of the breaking out of the war in Azerbaijan.
At the same time Jafarova strongly believes that Azerbaijan Mass Media should have covered the war more thoroughly and objectively.
Louise Pogosyan, the editor-in-chief of southcaucasus.com believes that Azeri Mass Media shed a light on the actions taking place in August during the conflict much better than Armenian Mass Media.
“We were fascinated how Azeri Mass Media were “purely” covering the actions happening in Georgia. They were interested in facts only. Even though, as it was noted, there was a lot of propaganda in Azeri Mass Media, the news consumers had a complete image of the situation in Georgia as well as they could track down all events in chronological order” Louise was quoted saying.
According to Louise, Armenian viewers were interested more in the analysis of how the major powers such as Russia, the USA and NATO would influence Caucasus.
“Armenian viewers are concerned with the issue of Georgia leaving the CIS,” says Louise. “This subject is of a great importance for us since the questions of visa to Georgia, transportation and import might arise. However, Armenian Mass Media was not covering those issues, taking into consideration the fact that we must be aware in advance of any negative changes that might take place.”
The participants of the round-table have come to a not very comforting conclusion: in case any military actions take place in Georgia, Armenia or Azerbaijan, the neighboring countries will know about the situation as little as they did during the war in Georgia. The journalists feel that this indifference is caused by the countries being split.
Nevertheless, all participants assume that there are plenty of subjects which might represent a great interest for our societies. As for Vafa Jafarova, she thinks that spreading information about democratic processes taking place in the South Caucasus would be very useful for these societies.
“I think that it would be very interesting to learn how legal procedures are covered in Georgia. Besides that it would be very useful to take a close-up look into important law cases happening in Georgia and use them as an example for the courts in Azerbaijan since they are not affected by a social opinion and pronounce ridiculous sentences. This might influence future verdicts in the neighboring countries.”
In Louise Pogosyan’s opinion the issue of legal proceedings is a problem for all post Soviet countries.
“It is not customary for us to sue. Everyone considers the Court an organ of repressions from the government. The cases are usually solved by civilians before they even sue one another, especially if one party is more powerful than the other one. In my opinion the Court should be a place where the conflicts are settled. In order to do so, we ought to change the mentality of our people and the judiciary system itself. However, without a well-planned publicity this issue will not be solved.”
The problem of economic cooperation is also vital according to the participants of the round-table.
Tiko Tsomaia (Lecturer of GIPA)
“I, personally, think the economic processes taking place in our countries should be of a great importance since a lot of events are correlated. The transits of energy carriers and other goods, the system of the power supply and use of energy sources are actual even today.
Idrak Abbasov (journalist, the “Mirror”)
“From the top of my head I can name the following topics: national minorities, the usage of the water resources, transit projects, the creation of a united regional energy system, and conflict resolution. Therefore, there are a lot of issues that might assist cooperation of Mass Media among the countries.”
It seems as though, there are a lot of common issues to be discussed. However, the question is how to perform those projects technically for all countries of the South Caucasus. The “Panorama”, issued by the British Institute of War and Peace (IWPR), was taken as an example. At the very beginning the newspaper was interesting and called-for. Nevertheless, it was published only for 6 years and then was closed down due to unknown reasons. What is more, common Caucasian newspaper will not be able to cope with the following obstacles: information collection, page-proofing, typographical printing, and delivery. The previously mentioned subjects will take a lot of time to be performed, and, as a result, the reader will be provided with the outdated information. Nonetheless, the analytical materials will still represent importance.
However, George Vanyan’s idea of common Caucasian newspaper or a magazine remains open. He was supported by other participants, according to whose opinion an electronic version of the newspaper would not reach a common reader.
“The Internet access is available only in the big towns of Armenia, whereas there is no Internet connection in the rural area, which means that electronic version will not acquire readers,”- says Louise Pogosyan.
According to Vafa Jafarova the problem of this kind is present in Azerbaijan as well.
“We need to take into consideration the fact that most population of Azerbaijan lives in the rural regions of the country. The level of connection makes matters worse, since the majority is DSL users. The connection speed is very slow, which makes it difficult to open even one single page. The mentioned above facts affect the visiting of information web pages.”
The idea of the radio station was not accepted as well.
George Vanyan:
“The information published in the newspaper already represents a document. The information broadcasted by means of the radio is single and very vague. It is very difficult to prove the information broadcasted via the radio, and it might be an unreliable source of information.”
Tiko Tsomaia does not agree with the idea that radio-format will not have a future:
“In my opinion, any traditional media – radio, television, newspaper – should have their own version in the internet. This increases the efficiency and creates an element of interactive communication. And for the radio – this is an opportunity to register their news so that other Mass Media could refer to it.”
Louise Pogosyan thinks that it is much more complicated to hire journalists for a radio station: “We desperately need qualified staff.”
According to Vafa Jafarova, the same issue represents a problem in Azerbaijan as well.
“The journalists are underpaid and this profession is thought to be not prestigious. Let’s take for instance the graduates from GIPA (Georgian Institute of Public Affairs) or from other similar institutions – they rarely take up a job of a journalist. They go on to work in the banks or oil companies,” said Jafarova.
The issue of sponsorship of common Mass Media in the South Caucasus was raised as well. The participants discussed whether it should be commercial or sponsored by the grants. The final agreement, however, was not achieved. The participants believe that commercialized type of Mass Media would be more viable. However, some of the participants pointed out a question that looking for advertisers might cause certain setbacks.
“The prospective advertisers might be identified after a thorough market research is performed,’ says Tiko Tsomaia. “In my point of view Mass Media that covers such a big region would be interesting for the entrepreneurs in the whole region. This is a far bigger market than the business people from Armenia, Georgia or Azerbaijan had previously dealt with. What we need is to decide on the format of this Mass Media and on the prospective spectators.
Thereby, starting with the discussion of the war between Georgia and Russia, the participants of the round-table arrived at the conclusion that we should communicate more with each other before the war or any other similar disaster begins.
“There is a common opinion that the absence of bad news is already a good news, – says Louise Pogosyan, – but if the bad news are inevitable than we should know them in advance. In other words, if you are warned then you are armed.”
Beslan Kmuzov, for newcaucasus.com
Round table “Coverage of the Georgian-Russian War in August, 2008 in Mass Media of Azerbaijan, Armenia and Georgia” organized by the fund of Conrad Adenauer and the editorial board of the newcaucasus.com together with NGO “Caucasian House”
