Resolution of the 70th General Assembly
Santiago, Chile
October 17 – 21, 2014
WHEREAS
the Argentine government continues to aggravate its model of a biased distribution of official advertising, ignoring Supreme Court rulings urging it to do so by respecting objective and reasonable guidelines and safeguarding freedom of expression;
WHEREAS
public funds allocated for this purpose keep growing – they increased by 63% over the previous year - reaching unprecedented market levels;
WHEREAS
the aforementioned funds continue to be used without any technical criteria or objective standards, and conversely, as a system of rewards and punishments to the media that depends on their publishing trends, turning such funds into indirect censorship tools;
WHEREAS
such abuses have led to outrageous results - a stylist without any media formation receiving personal funds in the amount of 20.7 million pesos in the first 5 months of this year -;
WHEREAS
such attitudes openly and directly violate the San José de Costa Rica Agreement and Article 7 of the Declaration of Chapultepec, namely: "Tariff and exchange policies, licenses for the importation of paper or journalistic equipment, the granting of radio and television frequencies, and the granting or withdrawal of government advertising, may not be used to reward or punish the media or individual journalists."
THE IAPA GENERAL ASSEMBLY RESOLVES
To urge the Argentine Government to cease its discriminatory practices in the allocation of government advertising, respecting fair and objective criteria, and to cease using public resources as a reward and punishment system;
To urge the authorities to comply with the rulings of the Supreme Court of Justice of the Argentine Nation and lower courts that demand an unbiased distribution of official advertising, compatible with the freedom of expression principles;
Insist before the Argentine Congress on the need for the enactment of a law to govern the assignment of official advertising in keeping with international standards.
