Javakhk is in a blind alley on the information highway.  Information enters and leaves this region with great difficulty.  The Armenians of the region have no information about what is going on inside the country, in their region, or what is being said about them abroad. The average resident of Javakhk does not know the decisions about them that are being taken by the government, the rights and duties that they have, the privileges that they can avail of and so on. 

Georgian public television and the Imedi television channel are only accessible to people who know Georgian.  According to residents, they don't even turn on those TV stations.

"We get the channels here, but why should we watch them if we don't understand anything?  They keep talking, but we only understand one or two words in each sentence," said 49-year old Sonya.

Eduard Alvertsyan, director of the Akhalkalak Youth Radio was convinced that having quality programming translated by the state into Armenian on public television and radio or even on other stations would remove Javakhk from this blind alley.  "They are now translating the news, but the quality is so bad that we end up changing the channel," the director complained.

There are three local television stations in Javakhk - ATV12 from Akhalkalak, JTV (Javakhk television) and Parvana from Ninotsminda.  These channels provide only local news.  That would suggest that the deficit of information would at least be minimal locally, but even there financial issues cause problems.  "The standard of the local channels is not very high either, they need money too - correspondents, new technology, recording and sound equipment - they are not efficient," confirmed Mels Torosyan, editor of the newspapers Akunk.

No Armenian or Georgian newspapers or journals reach the region - if someone gets their hands on one, it is only through friends or relatives and not regularly.  Local papers do not have large audiences because they are not affordable.  For example, Arshaluys, a newspaper from Ninotsminda (the only periodical from the Ninotsminda region), costs 60 tetri (around 120 drams).

Local newspapers don't have the financial or technical means to cover important events, especially if they occur outside their region.  The newspaper is printed in Yerevan, because the local printing house is not operational, but trips to Yerevan and other expenses amount to a large sum.

Javakhk also has the monthly paper Akunk, which is circulated for free, but it does not have a large printing volume either.  Only 500 copies are printed.  Akunk is not a newspaper in reality; it is more like a bulletin.  The Ministry of Justice of Georgia has not registered it as a newspaper, but they know of its existence at the Ministry.  According to the editor of Akunk, Mels Torosyan, the Ministry has simply ignored their letters.

"That is actually common practice in Georgia.  No letters of a social or political nature are replied to if they are from Javakhk.  We are forced to limit ourselves and print only 500 copies, because the corresponding organs are waiting for us to declare a large printing volume so that they can veto it and shut down the paper," said Mels Torosyan.

The mass media of Javakhk say that there are people abroad, even if they are only in immediately neighboring countries, who are interested in news from Javakhk and its local life, but cannot get accurate information from the region.

The residents of Javakhk in Akhalkalak can watch Armenian public television and the Armenia channel, while those in Ninotsminda catch Armenian public TV and H2.  But Armenian mass media cover events in Javakhk very rarely and when they do, it is only cursory in nature, based mostly on information received from news agencies.  Georgian news services often spread misinformation "because they are never interested in the real local life of Javakhk," said the director of Youth Radio.  In Alvertsyan's opinion, the information vacuum occurred mainly because of bad work by the mass media, "In both countries, Armenia and Georgia, the mass media don't have their own correspondents who would cover events objectively.  That is why the people of Javakhk are considered separatists, because the mass media portray them that way when they come to Javakhk.  And when they do come here, it is only when there are sensational events, demonstrations or shooting."

The editor of Akunk was also convinced that all the information given by state or state-affiliated structures was absolutely false and that this was done intentionally by the special services or state officials so that there would be no international pressure or demands towards Georgia on its path towards democracy.  "The way they present things abroad suggests that there are no problems in Javakhk, that social conditions are the same there as in Georgia's other regions. They don't consider the fact that Georgians feel secure in society while the people of Javakhk are not secure in any way - on the contrary, the daily pressure and fear slowly eat at one's soul, as a result of which people leave their homes, their homeland, and escape to other countries," said Mels Torosyan.

A number of different news agencies have been set up in Javakhk over the past few years - A-Info (www.a-info.org), Javakhk-Info (www.javakhq.info) and Bagin-Info (www.bagin.info).  All three are internet sites which also distribute information to other media, especially Armenian and Russian ones, as well as to individual readers.  "We have now come slightly out of that blind alley, we receive international news to some extent from foreign news organizations.  But many events, no less important, remain without coverage because of unresolved editorial and financial issues," said Narine Poghosyan, a staff member at Javakhk-Info.

However, material from news agencies is not accessible to regular residents of Javakhk, because the number of people with internet subscriptions in all of Javakhk (with a population of 95,000) does not exceed 100.

Mels Torosyan was convinced that the publication of a newspaper would solve the problem of providing the people of Javakhk with information.  The issue of informing the rest of world would be something that could be tackled over time by news agencies, he felt.

Akhalkalak