ZAGREB, Oct 13 (Hina) - The Croatian Journalists Association (HND) and the Media Council of the Croatian Helsinki Committee for Human Rights (HHO) on Monday opposed the same rules for coverage of the election campaign being imposed on
public and commercial television and radio stations.
ZAGREB, Oct 13 (Hina) - The Croatian Journalists Association (HND)
and the Media Council of the Croatian Helsinki Committee for Human
Rights (HHO) on Monday opposed the same rules for coverage of the
election campaign being imposed on public and commercial
television and radio stations. #L#
The HND said in a statement that the rules should not apply to
commercial television and radio stations with national licences,
but exclusively to Croatian Radio and Television (HRT) as a public
network.
The HND cited general provisions of the rules and those concerning
paid advertising, under which no party may have preferential
treatment and reporting on elections must be balanced, fair and
unbiased. The HND said all electronic media should adhere to those
rules.
The HHO said in a statement that the proposed rules "considerably
suspend independence of the media in key programme issues" and that
the rules should not be decided on by politicians and state bodies.
It would be disastrous for a national commercial television
network, such as Nova TV, to broadcast about 7,000 minutes of
programming on elections, because it would not be able to broadcast
scheduled commercial programmes which provide income to such
networks, the HHO said.
The HHO believes that the existing laws on HRT, electronic and print
media contain all the provisions necessary to ensure professional
coverage of elections and that no additional rules need to be
adopted.
The HHO said it would be best if public media formulated and
published their own rules.
(hina) vm sb