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On March 11, the Working Group on the Development of Legislative Basis for the Prevention of Hate Speech under the NA Standing Committee on Protection of Human Rights and Public Affairs discussed the research on the Regulation of Hate Speech on the Internet. Proposals were presented referred to the regulation of hate speech on the internet. The research was conducted in the framework of the Modern Parliament for a Modern Armenia Programme.

Persons who are engaged in the regulation and management of the internet domain, experts and representatives of public organizations took part.

The authors of the report, the UNDP experts Ara Ghazaryan and Davit Asatryan presented proposals related to the debated theme.

As a result of study, the experts proposed concrete formula, “self-regulation through regulation.” In the experts’ opinion, a German model can be applied in our country, according to which, it is proposed to give the primary mandate of the settlement of the context on the internet to the self-regulatory bodies, and the state regulatory bodies will exercise certain border control over the legality of self-regulatory mechanisms.

The state bodies should oversee whether the standards developed by them have been kept or not. “For example, one of the standards may be that if an organization has used hate speech, then it should not only remove that word, but also disseminate a statement that it has been due to their negligence,” Ara Ghazaryan noted.

According to the experts, the telecommunication sphere is to some extent regulated in Armenia, unlike domains. Conditioned by the information development and some expensive devices, control is almost not exercised over the context. It has been noted that there is consensus between the representatives of the given sphere of international public, that those devices can be considered as disproportionate measure of restriction of the freedom of speech, so it is not encouraged to apply these.

The international fight against the hate speech is carried out through the implementation of certain interventions. For example, an oversight board created by Facebook social media has been operating since 2021 and its work is to check the legality of block content on that platform.

“We should be very careful when setting regulations. It is noted in different documents of the European Union and the Council of Europe that if any regulation which will harm free speech should not be implemented,” Davit Asatryan said.

During the discussion, the Government - civil society - user cooperation was highlighted. An opinion has been voiced that may be a body for solving disputes should be created in the sphere of internet management which will make decisions related to both the hate speech and the ethical violations.

The Deputy Chair of the Committee Ani Samsonyan has stated that is not possible to solve the raised problems during one meeting: such discussions will also be organized in the near future. The research will also be discussed in the forthcoming sitting of the Internet Management Board by the proposal of the Committee members, proposals will be presented to the Government and the National Assembly aimed at developing a policy and making legislative reforms.