About IFEX:

News by region:

IFEX Campaigns and Advocacy:

IFEX Email Products:

Opportunities and assistance:

Alert

State seizure of radio station's shares

(RSF/IFEX) - In a letter to President Jacques Chirac, who is on an official visit to Russia, RSF protested the Russian Public Prosecutor's Office's 2 July 2001 seizure of fourteen percent of the radio station Echoes of Moscow's shares, which were to be given over to the station's journalists, as a guarantee of the station's independence, following the state company Gazprom's takeover of the Media Most Group.




"By taking control of the Media Most Group's flagship station, and having already taken control of the daily 'Segodnia', the weekly 'Itogui' and the NTV station, the Russian Public Prosecutor's Office is evidently completing the state's consolidation of power over the most influencial independent media outlets in Russia," stated Robert Ménard, the organisation's secretary-general. "The so-called judicial and financial nature of this matter fools no one. We ask that you discuss the matter with President Putin to remind him that democracy in Russia and the development of ties with the European Union cannot move forward in the face of such serious threats to information pluralism," added Ménard.

According to infortmation collected by RSF, on 2 July, the Russian Public Prosecutor's Office seized fourteen percent of the radio station Echoes of Moscow's shares. The Media Most Group's director, Vladimir Gusinsky, was expected to transfer the shares to the station's journalists shortly. The seizure followed a request by the state company Gazprom, which already owns twenty-five percent of the shares of Echoes of Moscow, which is the media group's most prominent media outlet to have remained independent.