Several media NGOs, including the Independent Journalism Center (IJC), have condemned the attempt by the mayor of the village of Costesti, Vasile Borta, to prevent journalists from accessing draft decisions of the village council. In a joint statement, they called on the local elected representative to respect his obligations under the legislation on transparency in decision-making.

Ialoveni Online reporters tried for a week to obtain drafts of some of the decisions on the agenda of the June 30 local council meeting, but their requests were rejected by the local administration in Costesti. Although, according to the law, the documents concerned should have been made public well in advance of the meeting, the council secretary told journalists about “the mayor’s indication not to send them the documents.” For his part, the mayor said he would not provide them with any documents because he did not know what purpose the journalists who wanted access to them were pursuing.

The signatories of the declaration inform the mayor of Costesti that both the law on local public administration and the law on transparency in decision-making expressly provide for the right of citizens and interested parties to have access to draft decisions of the local council and the mayor’s office and oblige the authorities to ensure access to this data.

The media organizations point out that this kind of approach is one of the factors that stagnates the growth of accountability, trust, and performance in the public sector. They call on the Mayor of Costesti to stop practices that undermine the mechanism of control over the work of public authorities.

The publication Detector Media analyses the main falsehoods spread by the pro-Kremlin press in the news about the second European Political Community (EPC) Summit organized on June 1 in Bulboaca by the Moldovan authorities and attended by 50 European leaders, including the European Union leadership.

The most widespread practice is devaluation, which consists of undermining the importance or success of certain events, decisions, and processes, often resorting to ridicule, irony, and disrespectful language.

Thus, pro-Russia propaganda channels have often portrayed the results of the EPC Summit as merely declaratory, consisting of joint photo opportunities and lavish banquets, without substantial political consequences for the participating countries.

In addition to downplaying the importance of the event, Russian media portrayed it as an attempt by Brussels to form an anti-Russian coalition and to persuade other countries to join sanctions against Russia.

Another tactic of the propaganda channels was to focus on the “alternative summit” of the Shor Party or the presentation of Ilan Shor as “the leader of the Moldovan opposition.”

Among the most frequent criticisms was a remark about the timing of the summit, claiming that the FPC overshadowed Children’s Day, traditionally celebrated on June 1.

The media coverage of International Children’s Day at the OrheiLand amusement park “seems a clear attempt to distract attention from an important event,” the source concludes.

The Gagauz Radio Television (GRT) Observation Council accepted Vadim Anastasov’s resignation as executive director of the public broadcaster on Tuesday (June 20) after he submitted an activity report. When asked about the reasons for his resignation, Vadim Anastasov did not comment. The Supervisory Board is to hold a new competition for the position of GRT’s executive director. The interim executive director will be the chief engineer of the GRT, Iaroslav Bulgaru, announces GRT.

Vadim Anastasov was appointed as the director of GRT on August 26, 2022, following a competition.

While still an unexplored field for the media in Moldova, artificial intelligence (AI) is gradually becoming part of the working tools of some journalists here. Media Azi reporters spoke to representatives of several media outlets to find out if and how they apply generative AI tools in their work or how reluctant they are.

The Northern Observatory team is using the Synthesia.io software as an experiment for the time being. Editor-in-chief Elena Cobăsneanu says she uses Synthesia for three tasks: creating templates for various columns, presenting news stories, and for video reports, which are the most popular. She also warns that the software can misread place names, for example, or put the wrong accent in speech. “It’s still a robot,” she says.

Some of the Agora portal team also use AI tools in their work. They mostly use ChatGPT for summarizing information and generating headlines, hashtags, and keywords used for social media. According to the media institution’s executive director, Irina Ghelbur, journalists were initially enthusiastic about it, but it is now met with reluctance from many journalists. Some fear they will lose their jobs and, as a precaution, try not to use it at all, says Alex Gurdila, general producer at Agora.

Alexandru Eftode, director of Radio Free Europe, points out that while speed is an advantage, it must be weighed carefully against the need to ensure that the information published or broadcast is accurate, objective, balanced, and meets the standards of quality journalism. According to him, colleagues on the team may use AI platforms for documentation or translation, but every response generated is verified.

Representatives of some media outlets are even more reticent. Ruslan Grabari, head of TV8’s news department, says the newsroom does not currently see ChatGPT, for example, as a reliable tool or partner. “We are afraid of errors. Besides, the information it provides cannot be verified, and the rules of journalism oblige us to quote live sources and not robots,” he says.

Victor Mosneag, editor-in-chief of Ziarul de Garda, points out that their newsroom does not use artificial intelligence at the moment either. “We are still studying the possibilities of using them more widely in our journalistic work,” he says.

Journalists from the Diez portal share the same opinion, saying they held a meeting with the team in April devoted exclusively to the topic of using artificial intelligence. “For now, we have decided not to use ChatGPT in the production of journalistic material. It’s not very stable yet and we can’t be sure of the information it provides,” says Petru Besleaga, editor-in-chief of the portal.

A study by the World Association of News Publishers suggests that half of news outlets use generative AI tools, while only 20% have defined ethical limits on their use.

The BC imposed sanctions of 49,000 lei on TV stations N4, Rlive TV, REN Moldova, Studio L, Exclusiv TV, TV6, and TVC 21 for violating the legal provision according to which media service providers are obliged to standardize the sound level of audiovisual programs with that during the broadcast of commercial communications.

At the meeting of October 21, 2022, the deputy chairperson of the BC, Aneta Gonta, ordered the monitoring of nine audiovisual media services on October 27, 29, and 31 of last year. Following the observations of the BC, it was found that only Vocea Basarabiei TV complied with the permissible deviation of the loudness level.

TVC 21 had the biggest deviations, being fined 9,000 lei (450 euro). Studio L – 8,000 lei (400 euro), TV6, Ren Moldova and N4 – 7,000 lei each (350 euro), Rlive TV – 6,000 lei (300 euro) and Exclusiv TV – 5,000 lei (250 euro). The sanctions were applied by unanimous vote.

According to a press release of the BC, during the past year, fines of 64,000 lei (3,200 euro) were imposed for advertising with increased sound levels.

A mechanism to subsidize media institutions would be adopted for the first time in Moldova. The initiative is currently at the public consultation stage. Parliament held its first debates on the document on June 27.

According to the draft law, the authorities intend to create an institutionally autonomous fund, partly financed from the state budget, through which projects and products developed by the media would be financially supported.

The fund would be administered by a board selected by representative media organizations, which would be subordinate to the Ministry of Culture, and the financial means would come both from the state budget and from donations, sponsorships, and grants from individuals and/or legal entities in Moldova or abroad.

Media institutions that will be eligible for subsidies must meet several criteria, including compliance with the Code of Ethics for Journalists, have been operating on the market for at least one year, have no tax arrears, are not insolvent, have not been fined more than 10,000 lei (500 euro) by the Broadcasting Council during the last year, and regularly publish financial and activity reports on their website.

The initiative aims to develop media pluralism, support cultural, educational, and media literacy projects, encourage the coverage of topics and issues of general social interest, support journalistic investigations, and strengthen editorial and economic independence.

The document also provides, at this stage, that the selection of beneficiaries will be conducted annually, through a competition, by the Ministry of Culture, and that media institutions will apply with projects corresponding to a list of priority themes, drawn up periodically by the Ministry. Winners would be selected by a Council of Experts, a new entity made up of seven members, four appointed by the Press Council and three by the Ministry of Culture. Members of the Expert Council would be eligible for appointment for a five-year term.

The initiative has not been registered in Parliament. It is also not yet clear what the criteria will be for deciding the final amount to be offered to each newsroom receiving a grant under the scheme.

The Independent Journalism Center (IJC) supports the initiative to institutionalize strategic communication mechanisms as an integral part of the national security system. However, the IJC believes that the draft law needs to be revised and improved.

“The institutionalized strategic communication mechanism is incompatible with simplistic approaches aimed at solving complex and systemic problems,” reads the IJC opinion on the draft Law on the National Center for Information Defense and Counter-propaganda – Patriot, published on June 22.

The document addresses several problematic aspects of the concept of the draft law published on May 30, 2023, by the Presidency of the Republic of Moldova, including the legal status of the future authority, the mechanisms for selecting and dismissing the leadership of the Center, potential risks to freedom of expression, financing of the Center, etc.

According to the analytical note, the definitions of several terms, such as disinformation, misinformation, and propaganda, in the current version, are inappropriate for a normative act.

On the mechanism of financing the Center, the IJC stated that the admission of the creation of a public authority’s budget from external sources has the potential to undermine the independence of a public authority and may constitute evidence of external governance.

The IJC also argues that the mechanisms for the selection and dismissal of the Center’s management should be improved to ensure the independence of the public authority.

Among other things, the IJC recommends revising the legal form of organization of the Center by incorporating it into the administrative structure of the Government, arguing that the organic and natural place of the new institution can only be within the organizational structure of the governmental administrative system.

Among the recommendations in the IJC opinion is the revision of the name of the regulatory act as well as the name of the Center.

The draft of the new law on access to information has been approved in its final reading by Parliament, with the affirmative vote of 53 MPs.

According to it, it will no longer be compulsory for requests to be signed in handwriting or electronically. The deadline for responding to requests would be no more than ten calendar days from the date of registration, and in the case of media representatives, the information would be generated immediately, but no later than five working days.

The deadline may be extended by a maximum of seven calendar days and five calendar days in the case of media representatives, respectively, if the request is complex or a large volume of information is requested.

It provides that any natural or legal person has the right of access to information of public interest. It also lists the modalities for access to information, the conditions under which access may be limited, procedures for requests for access to information or rules on personal data, etc.

Authorities will be obliged to publish a range of information about their work on their official websites as a matter of course. In addition, access to information of public interest could be limited in order to protect one of the following legitimate purposes: national defense or security, public security or public order, prevention or detection of criminal offenses or contraventions, the conduct of criminal proceedings, personal data, trade secrets, intellectual property rights and property, the environment, etc.

According to the information note on the initiative, the adoption of the document is necessary after the entry into force on December 1, 2020, of the Council of Europe Convention on Access to Official Documents (known as the Tromsø Convention), ratified by the Republic of Moldova in 2013. In addition, the objective is an action expressly stipulated in the implementation plan of the measures proposed by the European Commission in its opinion on Moldova’s application for accession to the European Union.

The document will enter into force six months after its publication in the Official Journal.

The Chisinau Court, Riscani, has ruled in favor of the Broadcasting Council in a case concerning the coverage of the war in Ukraine and the security crisis in the region by the TV channel RTR Moldova. It, together with the NTV Moldova channel, sued the Council, having been fined 5,000 lei (250 euro) and six public warnings in March 2022.

TV stations NTV Moldova and RTR Moldova were sanctioned by the BC for multiple violations. The monitoring of RTR Moldova found a lack of rigor and accuracy, as well as a lack of balance and mix of facts and opinions in news reports on the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The TV station dealt with the situation in Ukraine in a biased way and did not favor the free formation of viewers’ opinions.

According to the June 13 ruling of the first court, the TV station’s complaint was rejected as unfounded.

A day earlier, a similar decision was issued in the case of NTV Moldova. It had been sanctioned in the same hearing in March 2022 by the BC for its biased approach to the situation in Ukraine and failure to promote free opinion-forming. NTV Moldova received six sanctions, including four public warnings and two fines totaling 10,000 lei (500 euro).

It should be recalled that the multiple findings in the monitoring reports of the BC, implicitly the application of sanctions for lack of correct information in the coverage of national events, but also of the war in Ukraine” were among the arguments invoked by the Commission for Exceptional Situations on December 16, 2022, when it decided to suspend the broadcasting licenses of six TV stations, including NTV Moldova and RTR Moldova, during the state of emergency.