Opinions of some international organizations that the Council of Broadcasting is a dependent body are not right, the chairman of the Council of National TV and Radio Broadcasting, Nushiravan Maharramli, told Trend in an exclusive interview.
He voiced his disagreement with a report of the international organization Freedom House, which qualified the Council as a body depending on the authorities, as well as the facts on non-issue f licenses for television channels over last year.
The Council of National TV and Radio Broadcasting is an independent body and the channels are provided with all necessary facilities to function. Over the past year the situation in the sphere of television and radio broadcasting has become improved, while there still problems in this sphere. The opinions by some international organizations on Azerbaijan are wrong, as the neighboring countries are placed 30-35 points above Azerbaijan, he underlined.
The situation in the sphere of television and radio broadcasting is more improved than Azerbaijan. However, they placed Azerbaijan somewhere in the bottom and it testifies for biased attitude, according to Maharramli.
Over the past year Public Television was granted with a license and broadcasts throughout the country 24 hours a day. Maharramli did not consider that the number of television channels could define level of democracy in the country. Definition of the level of democracy through number of TV channels in a country is a wrong approach. There can be 100-200 television channels in the neighboring countries, but it does mean that we should have channels in the same cumber, he stated.
He also noted that the Council was working over the extension of license of 5 television channels, three of them are regional, while two (Lider and ANS) republican After the issue on opening of new television channels will be considered.