Topics on the European integration have gradually left the agenda of both the government and the media. On the eve of the Parliamentary elections instead of reporting the fulfillment of loud statements regarding the realization of "European vector", the citizens of Ukraine listen to the talks about "improvement", and team that fulfills its "promises".
In this very context - "fulfillment of promises" - we offer the analysis of progress in the process of political dialog with the EU, namely, its narrow part on providing the conditions for free media. Now it is not about the promises, but about the duties of the Ukrainian government that declared its European integration aspirations on the legislative level.
Thus, the political dialog Ukraine-EU within the framework of creation of free information space in the country provided two simple things:
- Cooperation on the development of public broadcasting system, including the exchange of best international practices, establishment of legal framework and its implementation in accordance with the European and international standards.
- Cooperation on the creation of conditions needed for free work of journalists and their protection against the threats and actual violence. It will include the exchange of best practices in the field of effective protection of journalists by the law enforcement agencies.
In fact, it is all about mutual commitments.Ukraine has to establish legal framework, namely, approve the needed laws and put them in practice, provide an adequate performance of law enforcement system regarding the protection of the rights of journalists and their physical security. The EU is committed to provide the best European experience regarding the functioning of such mechanisms as public broadcasting and framework for better provision of rights of the media.
During six months the independent experts were monitoring the fulfillment of these clauses and it is possible to conclude that Ukraine is far from their realization: work conditions for the journalists and media on the eve of the elections 2012 demonstrate a sudden deterioration, while no one even mentions the public broadcasting.
The detailed analysis shows that the level of fulfillment of the priority is higher on behalf of the EU than on behalf of Ukraine.
The experts of the European Council provided the analysis of the draft Law on the Public Broadcasting, which was developed by the Presidential Administration and finished by the Cabinet of ministers. It was Serhii Liovochkin, who is the Head of President's Administration, who sent this draft law for the expertise to the European institution.
The expert of the European Council Eve Salomon criticized severely the work of Ukrainian government and clearly pointed on the parts, which do not allow creation of a really independent public broadcaster, namely, she underlined the offered state financing without a mechanism of prevention of state influence, the opaque format of creation of a Supervisory board of broadcasting, and the absence of clear commitments regarding the content.
The European Council conducted a number of public evens: seminars and conferences aiming at demonstration of the European experience in the sphere of public broadcasting development. The events were attended by the leading European experts and were opened both for the Ukrainian Government and society.
In turn, the OSCE launched a project aiming at the improvement of cooperation between the journalists and law enforcement agencies, which also provides the engagement of the leading world experts to develop a training program on the basis of the leading experience of different countries and also 5 joint trainings for the mixed groups, which will include the employees of the law enforcement agencies and journalists.
In this particular case we talk about the joint project of the OSCE and the Ukrainian government, which is realized on request of the Presidential Administration and Ministry of internal Affairs.
Among the positive aspects of the attempts to provide the component on the work conditions of journalists and media, it is important to mention the permanent work of Interdepartmental working group, which consists both of the representatives of the government and law enforcement agencies, and representatives of media, and it aims at efficient resolution of conflicts regarding journalists and media.
The sessions of the working group demonstrate the conflicts in public space and provide fast communication between the people responsible for their settlement. During the last month, few very important problems were solved by virtue of this commission:
- it provided a public report on the investigation of the homicide of a journalist Vasyl Klymentiev in Kharkiv, which according to the investigation was committed by the police officer;
- it facilitated the closing of a criminal case on the issue of disclosure of the private data from the correspondence of the Deputy Volodymyr Ladnik by the Internet resource Livyi Bereh (Left Bank);
- it facilitated the closing of a criminal case against the Director General of TV channel TVi - Mykola Kniazhytskyi.
However, it should be stated that the number of conflicts, which could be considered as the interference with the functioning of journalists, constantly increases and it proves the absence of conditions and legal framework to provide the work and safety of journalists. The situation is vice versa: the existing system aims at preventing the free dissemination of independent information in the society.
The facts supporting this statement:
- the crimes against the journalists are frequently committed by the officers of the law enforcement agencies, who are supposed to protect the human rights;
- no employee of the law enforcement agency was punished after the conflict with a journalist;
- proceedings under the Article 171 of the Criminal Code (obstruction of journalistic activities) are instituted very rarely, thus there are almost no precedents of punishment of the officials for their try to interfere with the free information exchange;
- the journalists of different publishers are complaining in public about the pressure and censure, however, the investigations do not take place.
There is no progress in the public broadcasting either. The developed bill sunk in the bureaucratic labyrinths after it was criticized by Europe. And today the party in power does not include its approval in the list of its priorities. Taking into consideration the political situation in Ukraine, probably, the expectations of the reform, which would convert the state broadcasting into a public one by the end of 2012, will not bring any results.
European integration is not only about nice words and a lot of meetings of Ukrainian politicians with their European homologues. It is a specific technical work concerning specific legal mechanisms, which will create in Ukraine the European life conditions for all of us. This is what the leading representatives of Ukrainian Government repeatedly promised: to perform laborous technical work and to create "Europe in Ukraine".
However, even here the reality appeared to be far from the declared goals. European rules and laws lost in struggle with lobbying, corruption, populism and desire to provide oneself with the "comfort information space." It revealed that the main priority became the desire to control the media, to tame the independent press and to "manage the information content" in he manual mode. All this is not a less significant problem for the European integration than the incarceration of political opponents of the current government. In fact, these issues are of the same nature. This policy is too distant from the European standards and provides a reverse movement from Europe.