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Letter of Broadcasting Company “Hereti” To Human Rights Center

April 12, 2007

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I am sending a letter to you once more about the article that was published by the Human Rights Center on March 28. Gela Mtivlishvili, a representative of the center provided the article to the center.

The article revealed the investigation of Ramaz Samkharadze’s being assaulted, the director of the Broadcasting Company Hereti. We would like to point out that the article revealed incorrect and incomplete information.

The Broadcasting Company Hereti would like to define that Ramaz Samkharadze, the director of the company, has never commented on the incident with Gela Mtivlishvili, the representative of the center. Besides that, if the center published the comments of the prosecutor’s office or some other bodies it does not mean that Samkharadze made comments with the Human Rights Center; moreover, similar information had not been spread by any other sources either.

If the article was to be balanced, that should certainly have been kept by the Human Rights Center, then Ramaz Samkharadze’s comments should also been mentioned regarding the groundless accusations of the former MP Kapanadze.

Despite the fact that the article was unbalanced, the petition of the director of the Hereti Company, where he officially commented on the incident, was not published by your organization.

Several days after you ignored the petition, the information was broadcast by other news portals.

I want to underline that the former MP’s accusations against me were groundless and disinformation. Similar situation has never take place in the Broadcasting Company Hereti.

I want to point out that the Hereti follows Georgian Legislation and have paid all taxes since 1998.

Radio Hereti is the only independent electronic media source in the Kakheti Region.

Moreover, instead of publishing our letter, Ramaz Samkharadze’s rights were blatantly violated when on April 11 your organization published another article of Gela Mtivlishvili on the official web-site.

We wonder what the Human Rights Center does not agree with?-Do you think that the positions of all parties should be revealed in the article? Or do you prefer to write an article about unbalanced information? Or the exaggerated information about the over-phone conversation that was mentioned by the representatives of the center is to be appreciated? Or the information of our harsh reaction on TV Company Imedi for publishing the information had any ground?

We have feeling that current situation has some particular aim and it is the discrediting of Samkharadze and his Broadcasting Company Hereti. And it happens while the investigations on the journalists’ harassment have been suspended and the justice was reached in Kakheti for the first time.

The incident was investigated through with the support of the Public Defender’s Office and the US State Department’s 2006 report, which stated that local authority had not investigated Samkharadze’s case yet.

We would like to define that the administration of the Broadcasting Company has never applied to anyone else to publish the company’s supporting letters as well as to your center.

Could you explain us what is the aim of allocating so much unverified information on the web-site of your prestigious enough organization that protects human rights?

We demand to verify the information from other sources, including TV Company Imedi, which was mentioned in your article. Local journalist for the Imedi prepared much unbiased information about the incident.

We categorically demand to publish this reply on your organization’s web-site which shows the position of the Broadcasting Company Hereti and its director Ramaz Samkharadze.

Sincerely,

Broadcasting Company, Hereti 

                             
 
We cannot agree with the accusations as if unverified information is published on our web-portal. I, as an editor of the web-portal, will never commit such mistake.

In addition to that I cannot share the opinion of the board for the Broadcasting Company Hereti which stated that Human Rights Center publishes unbalanced and exaggerated materials in articles. It is a serious accusation and it should be proved by valid evidences. For this particular incident I would not allow anyone to discredit the portal. Gela Mtivlishvili, a journalist for the Human Rights Center, does not agree with the accusations of Ramaz Samkharadze, the director for the Broadcasting Company Hereti and he is ready to answer all questions in the case of necessity.

Now I make this comment not to protect any of the journalists; and I think I am obliged to publish Samakharadze’s letter completely.

Here I have enclosed a link where you can see the article that has caused the disagreement:

http://www.humanrights.ge/geo/articles.php?tbl=articles&id=669

Besides that you can also see a reply from Gela Mtivlishvili:

http://www.humanrights.ge/geo/articles.php?id=686

Sincerely,
Editor for the Web-Portal
Nino Tarkhnishvili

                              
 

 

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