During the run-up to the referendum on amendments to the RA Constitution (November
27, 2005) Yerevan Press Club is holding a series of training seminars for journalists
reporting on the referendum campaign and the process of constitutional reform
in general. The project is implemented with the assistance of UN Development
Programs and aims at improving the reporting practices of major political campaigns,
thus contributing to the more active role of media in the public life of the
country.
On November 16 and 17 in Yerevan and Vanadzor the first two training sessions
were held. During the sessions, in particular, the preliminary findings of the
media research were presented. The research is realized by Yerevan Press Club
under “Monitoring of Democratic Reforms in Armenia” project, supported by OSI
Human Rights and Governance Grants Program.
Monitoring of Armenian media coverage of constitutional referendum is administered
on November 5-25, 2005. Its object are the main newscasts of the information
programs and commenting programs of 4 national TV companies (Public Television
of Armenia, “ALM”, “Armenia”, Second Armenian TV Channel) as well as 7 national
newspapers (“Hayastani Hanrapetutiun”, “Republic of Armenia”,
“Aravot”, “Azg”, “Golos Armenii”, “Haikakan
Zhamanak”, “Hayots Ashkhar”).
Besides the quantitative data, for the first week of the study (November 5-12),
the participants of the seminars were introduced to the qualitative analysis
of experts on the content of TV and print materials on the subject of interest.
Also, in Vanadzor the results of a similar research for the media of Lori region,
made by Vanadzor Branch of Helsinki Citizens Assembly, were presented.
The next two seminars will be held on November 18 in Gyumri and on November
23 in Yerevan. On November 30 in Yerevan a concluding session will be conducted.
