Estonian Minister of Culture Urve Tiidus expressed on Tuesday that creating a new Russian-language TV channel Baltic-wide is a better idea than banning the existing ones, according to the report by Estonian Public Broadcasting (ERR).

Tiidus told ERR radio on Tuesday that banning a station will not bring success, instead, providing truthful and reliable information is more important, which is why the founding of a new channel would be more effective.

Earlier, Ivars Belte, member of the supervisory board of Latvian Television, has suggested creating one Russian-language channel for all Baltic states to present more accurate information.

Tiidus commented that the idea is worth considering and practical steps must be taken, but added that a new channel would require considerable resources, the ERR report said.

Belte said there is interest in creating the channel but ministerial meetings of the three Baltic countries must be the next step. Tiidus said there has been no written proposal so far, so she will decide in the coming days whether she will contact Belte herself.

Meanwhile Tiidus also stressed that developing the potential of existing media outlets should not be ignored, citing the good ratings of the Russian-language edition of ETV's news program Aktuaalne Kaamera.

One day earlier, Estonian Internal Security Service has also stated that banning Russian television channels and its programs in Baltic region is not an effective way.

Latvia and Lithuania, two of the three Baltic countries had made respective decisions to shut down Russian TV channels for a period, the Estonian media reported.

Estonia has a total population of 1.3 million people, among which one of four is Russian nation-wide while one third of about 400,000 people in the capital city of Tallinn are Russian.