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<<previous | index | next>> MediaBlocs or parties with candidates registered in more than sixty constituencies are entitled to free air time and print space in national state media.34 Human Rights Watch received no complaints of abuse of these entitlements, and according to OSCE media monitoring this requirement is being fulfilled.35 However, media monitoring by local groups and the OSCE shows that television, the medium from which most of the population receives their news, broadcasts news with overwhelmingly pro-government content.36 On September 30, the National Television and Radio Council, the body in charge of broadcast media, ordered ANS radio to close down its Shaki branch radio station. The Shaki branch had been broadcasting a daily thirty-minute news program since September 1, 2005 in which it aired interviews and debates with a broad range of parliamentary candidates from the region. The Council stated that ANS had breached the terms of its license in broadcasting the program. ANS disputed this, as did the Minister of Communications.37 According to ANS, a representative of the National Television and Radio Council claimed that ANS had violated the law by broadcasting "wrong information." The case raises concern of a politically motivated closure because of the content of the radio station’s programming. [34] Human Rights Watch interview with Dan Blessington, IFES, Baku, October 3, 2005. Four blocs and parties are entitled to free airtime in the run-up to the November elections: the YAP; the Liberal Party of Azerbaijan; New Policy (YeS) bloc, an opposition coalition of smaller parties and well-known political figures; and the Azadliq bloc. Azadliq is a coalition of three opposition parties, Azerbaijan Democratic Party (ADP), Musavat, and the Popular Front of Azerbaijan−Reformers Faction (Popular Front Party). Forty-eight political parties and blocs are contesting the 125 seats in parliament. OSCE/ODIHR Election Observation Mission, Republic of Azerabaijan – Parliamentary Elections 2005, Interim Report No.1 (5-23 September 2005). [35] OSCE/ODIHR Election Observation Mission, Republic of Azerabaijan – Parliamentary Elections 2005, Interim Report No.1 (5-23 September 2005). [36] For example, in its second interim report, the OSCE found that in the first four weeks of the campaign period, state owned AzTV devoted 99 percent of its political and election coverage to activities of the incumbent president, government, and the YAP. The most balanced coverage was provided by the private ANS channel, which allocated 81 percent of its political and election coverage to the president, government, and YAP. OSCE/ODIHR, Election Observation Mission, Republic of Azerbaijan – Parliamentary Elections 2005, Interim Report No. 2 (24 September–7 October). Prior to the beginning of the official election campaign in September, a local organization, the Najaf Najafov Foundation, carried out a media monitoring project “Parliamentary Elections in the Mirror of Mass Media: monitoring and discussing,” funded by the Eurasia Foundation, which came to very similar conclusions of an overwhelming pro-government bias in media reporting on Azerbaijan television. Round table meeting on media monitoring by the Najaf Najafov Foundation, International Press Center, Baku, August 12, 2005, attended by Human Rights Watch. [37] Statement from ANS, received by Human Rights Watch on October 3, 2005, on file with Human Rights Watch. OSCE/ODIHR, Election Observation Mission, Republic of Azerbaijan – Parliamentary Elections 2005, Interim Report No. 2 (24 September–7 October).
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