The ministry circulated the bill last week two days before the chief of Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian’s staff warned media outlets to “quickly self-regulate” or face government measures which they would consider a “restriction of freedom of speech.”
The bill involving draft amendments to the Armenian Civil Code and a law on mass has yet to be formally discussed and approved by Pashinian’s government. Its authors say the amendments are necessary for protecting citizens’ “private and family life, honor and reputation” against hate speech.
Prominent editors and reporters working for outlets not controlled by the government dismiss the official rationale for the legislative change. They believe that content takedown orders, also applicable to reader comments, would primarily target news reports critical of Armenia’s political leadership.
“They view negative evaluations of their work as insults,” said Aram Abrahamian, the veteran editor of the Aravot newspaper. “That’s the problem.”
“When you say, for example, that a particular individual loses his temper in the parliament, that could be seen as an insult,” he said, clearly alluding to Pashinian’s regular outbursts.
“The boundaries of insults are very blurred and subjective. Any criticism could be deemed an insult and lead to an order [to a media outlet] to remove it from its website,” added Abrahamian.
“We do not have trustworthy courts to be certain that they will not make decisions for political reasons or for the sake of concrete persons,” said Grisha Balasanian, a reporter with the investigative publication Hetq.am.
Armenian currently allows courts to fine digital platforms and other media for defamatory content and order them to publish a retraction. But they cannot be told to take down entire articles from their websites in such cases.
Balasanian linked the government plans to introduce such punishment to Armenia’s next general elections due in June 2026. The authorities want to suppress media criticism of Pashinian and his political team ahead of the elections, he claimed.
The chief of Pashinian’s staff, Arayik Harutiunian, added to such concerns on May 2 with a social media post made on the eve of World Press Freedom Day. He accused unnamed media and journalists of abusing press freedom “as a means of inciting intolerance and provocation” and demanded their “quick self-regulation.”
“Otherwise, the public will force the authorities to use serious regulatory tools, which you will qualify as a restriction on freedom of speech,” warned Harutiunian, who is also a leading member of the ruling Civil Contract party.
Armine Ohanian, the founder and editor of the Yerevan daily Hraparak, which also has a popular news website, dismissed what she called an attempt to bully and muzzle publications that regularly publish reports critical of Pashinian and government corruption.
“Freedom of speech is one of this country’s few achievements, and we are not going to let the likes of Arayik Harutiunian trample that freedom underfoot,” Ohanian told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service.
Aravot’s Abrahamian likewise denounced Harutiunian’s demands as a threat to press freedom. The editor, who has managed the independent paper for three decades, also said Pashinian and his entourage are more intolerant of criticism and dissent and than any of Armenia’s previous governments.
Pashinian himself is a former journalist and newspaper editor who had long been accused by the country’s former rulers of spreading fake news. He has claimed to have strengthened press freedom since coming to power in 2018. Journalists and other media professionals have disputed those claims.
In particular, they have argued that in 2021 Pashinian’s administration tripled maximum legal fines for “slander” and made it a crime to gravely insult state officials. The authorities decriminalized defamation under domestic and foreign pressure in 2022.