| The State Duma Committee for Information Policy held a
roundtable yesterday on "journalist' professional corporate ethics
and responsibility for materials published in the media. Problems and ways
or resolving them." The discussion of issues of journalists' ethics
almost developed into a brawl, but the participants were able to control
themselves in time. The session resulted in a recommendation to journalists
that they step up responsibility "within the creative collectives."
Opening the roundtable, Valery Komissarov (United Russia), head of the
committee for information policy (Ed. O.R. a popular anchor of a TV talk-show
before winning the elections to the State Duma), suggested it be seen
as a "talk among friends" but to judge by the faces of those
gathered together, a friendly conversation was not part of their plans.
As if out of spite, an enormous number of parliamentary correspondents
had come to the session and obviously enraged the discussion's participants
by their very appearance. Deputy Komissarov meanwhile tried to explain
what actually gave rise to the need for the roundtable:
"The beer corporations were unable to sort out their internal ethical
standards in time, which led to the State Duma's adoption of a law restricting
beer advertising in the media. If journalists are unable to work out internal
norms of behaviour, the deputies will simply have to take steps".
Meanwhile the journalists were debating who would be the first to cite
the example of the dismissal of Leonid Parfyonov from the NTV channel
for violating "corporate ethics." Valery Komissarov was the
first: "Parfyonov was asked to delay the broadcasting of the interview
with Yandarbiyev's widow until the court ruling, but he handed the material
to Kommersant, thereby possibly indirectly provoking the life imprisonment
sentence passed on our boys.
The deputy also cited other examples of journalist violation of corporate
ethics: "The flow of compromising information on the Internet,"
the creation of sites publishing unverified information and articles written
to order. The latter point particularly upset "Marching Together"
movement leader Vasily Yakimenko:
"Two months ago the Centre for the Development of the Free Press
published paid information in several high-quality - I am not afraid of
using the word - publications. We sent them a letter asking them to apologize,
but we received no reply. Then we set up posters with the word "Lies"
outside these publications' editorial offices, but that had no effect
either".
In this connection Yakimenko suggested printing the warning "Our
publication prints lies" in publications of this kind. "If an
author has lied once, the inscription should be published in a
format the same size as the relevant article, if he has lied twice, then
it should be published in centrefold, and if he has lied three times it
should be on the title-page.
"And the editor-in- chief should be branded!" Komissarov said
sarcastically in his summary.
Sergey Abeltsev (Zhirinovsky's LDPR) hastened to express dissatisfaction
with representatives of the media, finding the example of the murder of
the little Tajik girl in St Petersburg highly apt: "A little girl
was killed and there was a lot of broohaha over the matter. The journalists
raised a storm. But I made inquiries and found out that this family had
been using its children for drug dealing. The drugs were of poor quality
and a teenager died after using them. The murder of the little girl, against
whom no criminal charges could be brought because she was under-age, was
revenge!"
The participants in the discussion considered it their duty to note
that "children should not be killed in any circumstances" and
Boris Reznik (United Russia) even made so bold as to speak in defence
of the media: "Our roundtable has become a kangaroo court for the
press. We cannot resolve the ethics problem with any laws, this is a matter
for the journalist community itself and we can merely make recommendations."
In the end, agreeing that journalists "do not earn much" and
therefore print items that have been paid for, the roundtable participants
adopted recommendations that "staffer responsibility be enhanced
within the creative collectives for the publication of unreliable and
unverified facts
and that assistance could be provided to colleagues when preparing and
discussing publishable material." It is true that session participants
were unable to explain how these recommendations could be implemented
in practice.
See also:
Freedom
of Speech and Media Law in Russia
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