On January 9, 2007, the Yerevan Press Club distributed an appeal to the journalistic community of Armenia, in which a proposal was made to jointly develop the basic norms of professional ethics. YPC expressed the wish that “those norms are accepted by the largest possible number of mass media and journalists and applied during their daily activities”.

On February 2, 2007, a working group was formed at the meeting of media representatives who approved the YPC initiative. The group developed the Code of Conduct for media representatives and the attached Declaration on the principles of coverage of elections and referendums.

On March 10, 2007, the above-mentioned documents were accepted and signed at the meeting of mass media managers and representatives of journalistic organizations.

On March 10, 2007, the Media Ethics Observatory (MEO) was also elected, composed by 7 people.

On December 24, 2011, a decision was made at the meeting of representatives of the mass media and journalist associations to expand the composition of MEO to 14 members (7 more members participate in each MEO session on a rotational basis).

On June 25, 2017, and on November 9-11, 2018, changes were made to the composition of MEO at the regular general meetings of mass media and journalist associations.

On May 15, 2021, the composition of MEO was changed again at the general meeting of representatives of media and journalist associations.

On June 24, 2023, the composition of MEO was changed at the general meeting of representatives of mass media and journalist associations.

At the May 18, 2024 meeting of the representatives of media and journalistic associations it was resolved to expand the composition of MEO up to 15 members (at the same time, each MEO session is attended by 8 of its 15 members by a rotation principle).

As of today, the composition of the Media Ethics Observatory is as follows:

Davit Alaverdyan

Editor-in-chief of “Mediamax” news agency

Narine Avetisyan

Executive Director of “Lori” TV Company of Vanadzor

Ruben Babayan

Director, Professor of Yerevan State Institute of Theater and Cinema

Shushan Doydoyan

President of Freedom of Information Center

Karine Harutyunyan

Regionstv.am website director (Gyumri)

Levon Barseghyan

Founder and head of the “Aparez” club of journalists

Ara Ghazaryan

Lawyer

Ashot Melikyan

Chairman of the Committee for the Protection of Freedom of Speech

Gnel Nalbandyan

Chief editor of “Newmag” publishing house

Boris Navasardian

Honorary President of Yerevan Press Club, Chairman of MEO

Ara Shirinyan

Chairman of the Council of Public Broadcaster of Armenia

Nouneh Sarkissian

Managing Director of Media Initiatives Center

Angela Stepanyan

Editor of “Alt” TV station of Armavir

Vigen Sargsyan

Chairman of the Professional Ethics Commission of the Yerevan Press Club

Arsen Kharatyan

Founder of “Alik Media”

Heriknaz Harutyunyan

MEO Coordinator

Hakob Karapetyan

MEO Expert