Under a bill approved by Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian’s cabinet on Thursday, television and radio stations will not be allowed to disseminate calls for a violent overthrow of the constitutional order, “propaganda of war” or hate speech. The Armenian parliament controlled by the ruling Civil Contract party will almost certainly pass the bill. Parliament speaker Alen Simonian welcomed it on Friday.
Armenia’s Commission on Television and Radio (HRH), a regulatory state body, will be given a discretionary authority to determine whether the broadcasters comply with the new requirements. The HRH, which is dominated by Pashinian’s allies, will be empowered to not only fine broadcasters accused by it of violating the ban but also ban programs and even seek criminal proceedings against their authors.
“The [draft] amendments are aimed at limiting information that negatively affects citizens and making it possible to prevent the spread of misinformation, violence, hate speech and other harmful content,” Minister of High-Technology Industry Mkhitar Hayrapetian said during a cabinet meeting in Yerevan.
Media experts expressed concern at these restrictions on Friday, saying that they would put the freedom of Armenian broadcast media at greater risk. Artur Papian, the chairman of the Yerevan Press Club, said that the cases listed by the bill are open to arbitrary interpretation by the government.
Papian pointed to the highly controversial criminal case against Samvel Karapetian, a billionaire who was arrested and charged with calling for a violent regime in June. The accusation stems from Karapetian’s pledge to defend the Armenian Apostolic Church against Pashinian “in our way.”
“The HRH, which is obviously subordinate to the government, could easily decide to ban [TV or radio content,]” he told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service.
Ashot Melikian of the Yerevan-based Committee to Protect Freedom of Speech also objected to the new powers planned for the broadcasting regulator. He saw a connection between the measure and Armenia’s general elections due in June.
“Any such tightening [of media regulations] carries risks in terms of freedom of speech,” said Melikian.
Another declared purpose of the bill is to curb “external influences on Armenia’s information field.” The bill calls for a ban on foreign broadcasters accused of meddling in the country’s internal political developments with their news coverage.
“It means that if, for example, Euronews or CNN disseminates content that is not pleasing to the Armenian authorities, the commission (HRH) can decide to block it and even remove it from the archive, which is very controversial from a democratic point of view,” said Papian.
Papian suggested at the same time that Russian state TV channels are the principal target of these proposed restrictions. The Armenian government has repeatedly threatened to block their broadcasts in Armenia in response to their reports critical of Pashinian. The authorities in Yerevan already banned in March 2024 the retransmission of a daily political talk show aired by one of those channels.
Pashinian’s administration has implicitly accused Moscow of trying to undercut it ahead of the 2026 elections and asked the European Union to help it counter Russian “hybrid threats.” The Armenian opposition have dismissed these claims, saying that Pashinian is simply seeking the green light from the EU to disqualify opposition groups from the elections or rig them otherwise. Pashinian has repeatedly branded his political foes as Russian agents.
