The human rights organization Freedom House has published its annual report assessing the level of press freedom in 197 countries around the world in 2013.
This year Armenia received 62 points and took the 134th place in the rankings. Azerbaijan received 84 points, along with Vietnam, China and Laos and is on the 183rd place.
“In Azerbaijan the repressive media sphere has experienced a further decline due to the increased surveillance of Internet and telephone correspondence of the journalists and bloggers by the government; blocking site that hosts the image, which was associated with the leak of documents from the state security; and, according to the available information, state intervention in the satellite broadcasting radio “Free Europe”/radio “Liberty”. As a result, the country’s rating deteriorated from 82 to 84 points,” reads the statement.
Note that Georgia is on the 93rd place, Russia – 176th, Iran – 190th and Turkey – 134th.
In general, 63 (32%) countries were rated as free, 68 (35%) were partly free, and 66 (33%) were rated as non-free.
“We see a decline in media freedom globally which is driven by the support of the governments to control the information and to punish those who transmit it,” stated Karin Karlekar, the director of the project report.