Russia's major state companies will dispose of their media assets in the near future, said
Mikhail Seslavinskiy, head of the
Russian Agency for Press and Mass Communications. The Thursday announcement came just two days after Russian Deputy Prime Minister
Dmitri Medvedev, speaking at the World Editors Forum,
defended state-owned
Gazprom as the primary owner of Russian media assets.
Roman Abramovich, head of Russian investment company
Millhouse and a perceived Kremlin loyalist, is likely in talks to purchase
Kommersant, a publishing house best known for its liberal daily paper and “one of the last strongholds of independent media in Russia,” the
Moscow Times reported today.
Russia's state controlled gas giant Gazprom is set to increase its control over the country's media through the potential purchase of Komsomolskaya Pravda, the paper with the largest circulation; 817 000 copies daily in 2004 (statistic from World Press Trends 2005). Gazprom, however, would not confirm this report. The company is also rumoured to be considering buying the broadsheet Kommersant. The Russian government has been criticised for using Gazprom as a means to tighten its control over the media. For example, last June it bought a large percentage of shares of the independent newspaper Izvestia (see previous posting). This past weekend Russia saw protests precisely against state interference in the media sector (see previous posting).
Source: AFP (Registration required)
