PARIS — Armenia has fallen 16 places in the 2026 World Press Freedom Index published by Reporters Without Borders, ranking 50th compared to 34th the previous year.
According to the report, although Armenia remains among regional leaders in press freedom, the decline reflects mounting challenges within the country’s media environment. These include deepening polarization, unprecedented levels of disinformation, and the spread of hate speech driven by ongoing security concerns. Armenia’s score of 67.02 highlights the increasingly complex conditions under which the local press operates, shaped by internal political tensions and broader geopolitical pressures.
Globally, press freedom has reached its lowest level in 25 years. For the first time, more than half of the world’s countries are classified as having “difficult” or “very serious” conditions for journalism, signaling a widespread erosion of the right to information.
Several countries saw notable declines in the rankings. The United States dropped to 64th place. Georgia ranked 135th, while Turkey fell sharply to 163rd. Azerbaijan ranked 171st, and Russia was placed 172nd, underscoring the particularly severe conditions for media freedom in parts of the region.
Particularly concerning is the sharp decline in legal protections for journalists, with 60% of countries experiencing deterioration in this category. This trend reflects the increasing criminalization of journalism and the misuse of national security laws to restrict press freedoms.
Ongoing conflicts and regional instability—especially in Palestine, Sudan, and Ukraine—continue to have devastating effects on journalists’ safety. Meanwhile, Norway has maintained its position as the top-ranked country for the tenth consecutive year, while Syria recorded the largest improvement, climbing 36 places.
Despite these developments, the global outlook remains bleak. Today, less than 1% of the world’s population lives in countries where press freedom is considered “good.” Hostile political rhetoric toward the media, along with abusive legal actions, has increasingly become a systematic tool used to suppress independent journalism worldwide.
