At the meeting of the Press Council’s Board of Directors held on June 11, the issue of amendments to the “Code of Ethical Conduct for Azerbaijani Journalists” was discussed.
elchi reports that the Press Council informed Trend that two main points were focused on during the discussion.
It was stated that, first of all, the necessity of reflecting the inadmissibility of propaganda using hate speech in the rules was emphasized:
“As is known, sometimes the articles of the media, individual journalists, and especially the opinions they express, have a provocative nature. Of course, a journalist must report the truth. But in doing so, legality should not be pushed to the background. Accordingly, it is possible to criticize someone and point out that person’s shortcomings. But these presentations should not create an atmosphere contrary to the concept of a state governed by the rule of law. That is, it should be done in such a way that no one considers steps outside of this concept against anyone else as legitimate. Overall, lynching tendencies are unacceptable.”
It was added that the second amendment is related to the Supreme Court’s plenum decision “On the protection of personality rights”:
“This decision is extremely important and is a demand of the day. Because sometimes a journalist or media outlet that considers itself obligated to report the truth sets aside which truths are important for society. As a result, a biased image of the journalist and the media outlet emerges. In any case, there are truths that are not right to disclose. In this sense, the court decision provides detailed clarity on what is right and what is not. We believe that the relevant provisions should also be included in the amendments to the “Code of Ethical Conduct for Azerbaijani Journalists”.”
It was noted that amendments to the “Code of Ethical Conduct for Azerbaijani Journalists” are approved at congresses:
“For now, there is no concrete draft regarding the amendments. In any case, there is still time until the congress. We believe that there will be an opportunity to carry out relevant work in this direction in the coming period.”