We would like to respond to the incident, that took place in the Village Zvare, at the Railway construction site, between the citizens of Georgia and People’s Republic of China. The incident was covered in a xenophobic manner by some media outlets in Georgia.
Various internet-editions covered the story with the following headlines: „Situation in Zvare is even more tenze – the Chinese have wounded 4 Georgians with a knife or maybe with an axe.”; „In Kharagauli, the Chinese beat up the Georgian workers; „Georgian workers abused by the Chinese with armature – what went down in Zvare“, etc. while print media, namely, Rezonansi Newspaper published an article with the following title: “Chinese terror in Kharagauli.”
Interestingly, a month prior to the incident, the INFO-9 published a story, based on the account of a Facebook user: “The Chinese killed the quadruped friend of a Georgian citizen and ate its meat.”
We believe, that some media outlets, while covering the fact, placed the entire accent on the ethnic origins of the individuals, party to the incident and portrayed the fact as a physical violence of the Chinese against the Georgian, which overshadowed the actual reasons behind the story and the news of its expected consequences.
„Law on Broadcasting of Georgia” Article 56(2) stipulates„2. Broadcasting of programmes containing the apparent and direct threat of inciting racial, ethnic, religious or other hatred in any form and the threat of encouraging discrimination or violence toward any group, is prohibited.“ At the same time, the Code of Conduct for Broadcastersguiding principles talk about the importance of protecting the principles of diversity, equality and tolerance, while stipulating, that “Broadcasters should avoid drawing unjustified parallels between ethnic or religious origin and negative events, including associating activities of specific individuals with the entire group.” (Article 33(1))
According tothe Professional Media Standards, „a journalist indicates an individual’s ethnic or racial belonging, political or religious belief, social position, skin color or sexual orientation, if this information is directly linked with the essence of the case under review.”
Hence, both the legislation and the professional ethics standards require, that the effort of the journalists and the media outlets are focused on the correct and objective analysis of a case and not the other way around, fostering and feeding existing xenophobic attitudes and stereotypes in the society. Xenophobic coverage of the case by the journalists has unfortunately already caused the rekindling of discriminatory attitudes in the population. E.g., a Facebook campaign was launched: “No to Chinese Products.”
Based on all of the above-mentioned, we call upon broadcasters and other media outlets to refrain from such coverage and interpretation, which causes and rekindles discriminatory and xenophobic attitudes in the society, while the law-enforcement bodies must ensure a timely, objective and effective investigation of the incident.
Georgian Democracy Initiative (GDI)
Tolerance and Diversity Institute (TDI)
Media Development Fund (MDF)
