29 September 2003 00:46
Armed guards bar entry to Russian paper
Russia's fragile media came under fresh attack last night after
unidentified security guards attempted to take over the editorial offices of
the respected Russian newspaper Novoe Vremya.
The events illustrate the continued weakness of Russia's moves to impose
the rule of law, highlighting questions about the operation of the legal
system and stability of property rights.
Senior Novoe Vremya journalists locked themselves into their offices and
called the police after guards from the Primex security company attempted to
enter their rooms. Other journalists attempting to enter the building were
refused entry by the new guards.
The move follows the eviction of Novoe Vremya's own three guards late on
Thursday night.
The new guards, who were armed with machine guns, refused to identify
themselves but said the building had been legally acquired by their unknown
clients.
Novoe Vremya says it is the legal owner of the building, which has been
registered in its name for 40 years.
Novoe Vremya is a respected weekly Russian paper, with a monthly English
language version. "Putin, Luzhkov, Seleznyov, we criticise them all but
always in a coherent way," said one of the journalists locked out, in a
reference to Russia's president, the mayor of Moscow and the leader of
Russia's parliament respectively.
The raid comes as President Vladimir Putin is concluding a trip to the US,
during which fresh criticism was raised over pressure on Russia's media
and human rights violations in the republic of Chechnya.
The newspaper's building is directly opposite the headquarters of
Russia's own press ministry, near Pushkin Square in central Moscow. It
stands near the headquarters of the critical weekly newspaper Moscow News and
the daily newspaper Izvestiya, itself the subject of a hostile takeover
struggle between two competing Russian business groups in the mid-1990s.
"The obvious reason behind this attack is a commercial attack over the
building," said one journalist. "However what lies behind that, who
knows?"
Over the last three years, the Russian media have suffered a sharp drop in
the diversity of opinion and ownership, starting with national television
channels.
NTV has been taken over by the state-backed company Gazprom, and the other
two federal channels, the First and Russia, have been taken back under state
management.
Several Russian newspapers have also changed hands and others have been
threatened with closure as a result of legal actions seeking very high
damages for alleged libel.
[FTI [The Financial Times]] |
RUSSIA IN FACTS
