Moldova

[MD] Channel with programming from Moscow sanctioned

IRIS 2023-3:1/13

Andrei Richter

Comenius University (Bratislava)

The national media regulator, the Audiovisual Council of Moldova (CA), has sanctioned the television station "REN Moldova" with six fines totaling 30,000 Moldovan Lei (about EUR 1,500) and a public warning.

The violations were found by the CA during the monitoring of the programming of REN Moldova between 9 and 15 January 2023. They related to the non-compliant placement of advertising in the main “Evening News” bulletin, as well as the failure to indicate the sources of images in the news that had not been produced by the broadcaster itself, and an absence of a link between the images and the narrative of the news, thus violating the provisions of Article 13 (“Truthfulness of Information”) paragraph 5 subparagraphs (b) and (e), as well as of Article 66 (“Advertising and Teleshopping”) paragraph 3 of the Audiovisual Media Services Code (CSMA).

In accordance with the CSMA, the sanctioned media service provider is obliged to broadcast the text of the decision in the 48 hours following the date of adoption of the decision, with sound and/or visual image, at least three times, during peak audience hours, including at least once during the main news programme.

REN Moldova rebroadcasts programming of the Russian national TV channel REN-TV, owned by the National Media Group and which has been under EU economic sanctions since December 2022.

Meanwhile, the CA has announced that it will monitor several other channels that rebroadcast Russian TV programming.