Johnson's Russia List
#6035
23 January 2002
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A CDI Project
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#1
Russian closure of independent TV sparks wide concern
By Peter Graff

MOSCOW, Jan 22 (Reuters) - Russia abruptly pulled the plug on its only
nationwide independent television station on Tuesday, giving the Kremlin a
monopoly of the airwaves for the first time since the Soviet era and
sparking international concern.

Moscow has said the fate of TV6 is purely a business matter following a
court ruling upholding a shareholder's complaint that the station was
bankrupt.

But it has raised widespread concern over President Vladimir Putin's
tolerance of dissent and the independence of the courts.

Boris Berezovsky, TV6's owner, told Reuters the shutdown was the latest
move by the Kremlin to secure control over the media. He accused Putin of
"destroying" Russia's legal system.

The United States also questioned the legality of the closure and said
political authorities could have stopped it if they had wanted.

At midnight on Monday, a TV6 talk show host was interrupted mid-sentence
and replaced with test pattern stripes and the message: "We have been
pulled off the air." Power was shut off at the studio and telephones and
internet links were cut.

"The authorities today showed that their single goal is to gag us," TV6
General Director Yevgeny Kiselyov told Ekho Moskvy radio which later
broadcast some TV6 news bulletins.

Boris Nemtsov, head of the free-market Union of Right-wing Forces party,
told Ekho Moskvy: "This was a huge political mistake on the president's
part, and I hope that sooner or later somebody will explain that to him, or
he will realise it himself."

In Washington, State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said on Tuesday
the legal action and closure of TV6 was "extremely difficult to understand
in any business or any financial context."

"For some time there's been a very strong appearance of political pressure
in the judicial process against Russia's independent media, including in
this case," he told a news conference.

Asked if President Putin could have saved TV6 from closure, he replied: "I
would say that given the appearance of political pressure on the judicial
process that political authorities could have withdrawn that pressure, yes."

Boucher said "very unusual and rapid developments" had taken place in the
case against TV6 at high judicial levels where he said things normally took
several months.

In Berlin, German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer also expressed concern.
"It would be a considerable setback for the diversity of opinion and
diversity of media in Russia if this development led to the breakup of the
network without a substitute," he said.

Public reaction in Russia has been restrained compared to last year when
independent broadcaster NTV was taken over by the Kremlin-controlled
natural gas monopoly in a boardroom coup that led to street protests and
on-air strikes by reporters. Most TV6 staff were recruited from NTV.

The Kremlin says it had nothing to do with action against NTV and TV6,
though Putin has never concealed his contempt for Berezovsky and former NTV
owner Vladimir Gusinsky, or his belief they had abused the power of their
media holdings.

FINANCIER SAYS KREMLIN TIGHTENING CONTROL

Berezovsky, a former Kremlin insider turned Putin opponent and now living
in exile in western Europe, said TV6's shutdown was part of Kremlin plans
to tighten central control in Russia.

"I think the next logical step will be making the media further subservient
to the authorities and the forging of a single public opinion so that
everyone thinks the way the president thinks," he said by telephone.

"I believe the president has ruined the legal system. As for TV6, the
arbitration court adopted clearly illegal positions. It was a farce, a
comedy."

By pulling the plug, authorities silenced a team that, first at NTV and
then at TV6, dared criticise military tactics in Chechnya and expose
alleged corruption scandals in the Kremlin.

In both companies, huge oil and gas firms with ties to the state acquired
minority stakes and went to court to wrest management control from the
businessmen.

Media Minister Mikhail Lesin, who ordered TV6 switched off, told reporters
it was "in Berezovsky's interest to exploit the situation: he always has to
prove he is a dissident."

A tender for the channel would be held on March 27, he said, and TV6 could
resume "if the journalists are able to organise themselves and solve
their...problems."

In TV6's case, a pension fund for Russia's biggest oil company LUKOIL held
a 15 percent stake and won a court case to close the station, saying it was
bankrupt.

But TV6 said popular programmes, like Russia's first Big Brother-like
reality show, had improved its finances.

******

#2
Christian Science Monitor
January 23, 2002
Did business or politics silence Russian TV station?
Russia pulled the plug last night on TV-6, a nationwide independent news
station.
By Fred Weir
Special to The Christian Science Monitor

MOSCOW - Russia's last independent TV network went silent yesterday after a
legal checkmate, widely seen as orchestrated by Kremlin forces, abruptly
ended its year-long struggle for survival.

Analysts say there's little doubt that politics was the main factor in the
midnight closure of TV-6, a feisty news-driven network, which was replaced
on Moscow television screens by an all-sports channel. On the surface, the
network fell victim to a successful legal campaign launched last year to
liquidate it by a minority shareholder, the state-linked Lukoil petroleum
giant.

But experts say because TV-6 was 75 percent owned by renegade tycoon and
Kremlin opponent Boris Berezovsky, it sealed its own doom. The network's
news team, led by prominent journalist Yevgeny Kiselyov, had been unsparing
in its coverage of the war in Chechnya, official corruption, and
inner-Kremlin intrigues. "It is obvious that wherever Kiselyov goes to
work, the days of that company will be numbered," says Georgy Kuznetsov, a
professor of journalism at Moscow State University. "He incurred the wrath
of the Kremlin, and you can't get away with that."

Mr. Kiselyov and many of his TV-6 colleagues were journalistic refugees
from last year's messy takeover of the independent NTV television network
by Gazprom, the state-controlled natural gas corporation. After Kiselyov
was hired at TV-6 by Mr. Berezovsky, the network's ratings more than
doubled and, experts say, its finances improved markedly. But Lukoil, using
a Byzantine bankruptcy clause that has since been repealed by the state
Duma, or the lower house of parliament, soon launched its suit to destroy
the network.

"To liquidate a profitable company is like killing the goose that lays
golden eggs," says Alexei Simonov, chairman of the Foundation in Defense of
Glasnost, an independent media watchdog.

"There is no mistaking this situation: Lukoil was obeying political orders,
not acting in its own business interests."

Last week a court ordered TV-6 disbanded and its license put up for auction
in March. Press Minister Mikhail Lesin - notorious for his frequent
heavyhanded interference in the workings of Russia's media market -
suggested Kiselyov and his team might be permitted to remain at their jobs
until March, then bid for ownership of the company if they cut Berezovsky
out of the picture and immediately ended their struggle to remain in
control of TV-6. Kiselyov at first accepted the deal, then baulked.
Bailiffs moved in Monday night and pulled the network's plug. "It looks
like some kind of television coup," Kiselyov told the independent Ekho
Moskvy radio station. "The authorities have demonstrated that their single
goal is to gag us."

Few Russians have sympathy for Berezovsky, a former Kremlin insider who
pioneered the lawless slash-and-burn capitalism that nearly ruined Russia
in the 1990s and who routinely exploited his media assets for
self-promotion and political manipulation.

While the Kremlin says it wasn't involved in the NTV or TV-6 actions,
Berezovsky did have a falling out with President Vladimir Putin - whom he
had helped to bring to power - two years ago. "Berezovsky became rich due
to undercover intrigues and state support, and now that same system is
destroying him," says Andrei Milyokhin, director of Monitoring.ru, a Moscow
media consultancy. "Unfortunately, these methods will not lead to creation
of an open, free and competitive media market in Russia."

The closure of TV-6 leaves most Russians without an easily accessible
source of independent information. The country's two largest television
networks are controlled outright by the state, while the third, NTV, has
significantly toned down its news coverage since its takeover by Gazprom
last year. "The main victims in this situation are television audiences,
whose rights have been violated and trampled upon," the head of Russia's
Union of Journalists, Igor Yakovenko, told Ekho Moskvy. According to Eduard
Sagalayev, head of the Naitonal Association of TV Stations, 160 small
regional television outlets that purchased programming from TV-6 will
suffer serious business reverses due to the cutoff.

Even staunch supporters of TV-6 admit its closure does not spell the end of
free expression in Russia, just its marginalization.

"The takeover of NTV, and now TV-6, are milestones in the Kremlin's
campaign to place the biggest media outlets under state control," says
Sergei Ivanenko, a liberal member of the Duma's information policy
commission. "Freedom of speech continues to exist in Russia, just never in
prime time."

*******

#3
Russia: Vox Populi -- Muscovites Speak Out On Demise Of TV-6
By Francesca Mereu

Moscow, 22 January 2002 (RFE/RL) -- The demise of TV-6 -- Russia's last
remaining private nationwide television station -- was on the minds of many
Muscovites today. The station was taken off the air at midnight last night
after losing a court battle with minority shareholder LUKoil, which sued TV-6
for unprofitability. The case is strikingly similar to that of NTV, which was
taken over by Gazprom in April, and leaves Russians with no alternatives to
state television.

A Moscow radio station popular with young people this morning asked listeners
to call in and share their opinions of the TV-6 drama. One, a young man named
Volodya, said that only in Russia can there be a situation where you turn on
the television only to find your regular station has been replaced with
something completely different.

For Anatolii Chuchleb, a 40-year-old lawyer, the battle for TV-6 is an
attempt by the government to silence oligarch Boris Berezovsky, the TV-6
owner who has been living in self-imposed exile abroad since falling afoul of
the Kremlin. Although he says the blackout is not about press freedom,
Chuchleb says there is no question that TV-6 was the only unbiased channel on
Russian television.

"[In my opinion, TV-6] represented 'glasnost' in television. [State-owned] TV
channels, like ORT or RTR, are biased. They cannot speak the way TV-6
[journalists] used to speak," Chuchleb says. "For [Russians], it's a big
loss. But I believe that [TV-6 director] Yevgenii Kiselyov and his team will
not give up the fight."

Lyubov Brevdo, a 65-year-old pensioner, likens the TV-6 shutdown to Soviet
times, when free media did not exist in the country. Brevdo says that while
she didn't like TV-6 herself, she believes that people should have the right
to hear different opinions if they so choose.

"It's a pity [that the channel is off the air]. [TV-6] journalists are very
talented," Brevdo says. "I can't say that I liked everything they showed on
television, especially recently. But there are different opinions. I can
switch the TV off if there's something I don't like. Nobody's forcing you,
are they?"

According to a poll conducted by the Russian Center for Public Opinion, 39
percent of Russians surveyed said they considered the TV-6 shutdown a
political issue. Fourteen percent said they thought it was purely an economic
issue.

*******

#4
Moscow Times
January 23, 2002
An Orthodox Bank and TV Channels?
By Yulia Latynina

At the end of 2000, two of the five national channels were state-run. A year
later and there are no private national stations left. TV6 has suffered the
same fate as NTV, but with one major difference. NTV was devoured by the
victors, who were united in the division of the property of those who had
backed the wrong horse in the presidential elections.

Now, there is no unity within the Kremlin. The old guard from the Yeltsin era
and the new St. Petersburgers have locked horns,, and if one team wants to
get rid of TV6 then the other will support the channel.

The president has virtually removed himself from deciding the fate of the
channel. The word is that the leader of the hunt for TV6's frequency license
is Mezhprombank owner and presidential confidant Sergei Pugachyov -- an
obscure and somewhat sinister figure.

Pugachyov is not some Putin protege plucked from obscurity like Alexei Miller
or Sergei Ivanov. He was very close to Pavel Borodin, and the money for
Mabetex flowed through his bank. Also, it was Mezhprombank that issued
Yeltsin's daughters with the infamous credit cards.

Pugachyov also is the most influential bearer of Orthodox ideas in the
president's entourage. He introduced the president to Father Tikhonov. And he
lobbies for the creation of an "Orthodox bank," evidently tasked with
counterbalancing "Jewish capital."

When a banker who was living on the Cote d'Azur and was implicated in the
most dubious of the Yeltsin-era scandals not only becomes a devout believer,
but also manages to cement the main link between the head of state and the
church, it is hard to refrain from making the kind of accusations that are
often leveled against the founders of modern-day sects, i.e. that their true
faith and possibly a not entirely stable psychology paradoxically combine
with a very earthy knack to convert their faith into boundless influence and
large amounts of money -- often to the detriment of the spiritual health of
the nation and its rulers.

There is no doubt that people of Pugachyov's kind encourage the worst
instincts in the president. They instill in the authorities the idea that
television is a means for mass brainwashing -- no less effective than the
church was in the Middle Ages. And this can apparently be corroborated by
reference to the personal experience of the president: Putin would never have
become president if it were not for television.

The problem is that television is a wonderful means for getting Putin elected
to a second, third and 110th term, but it's no use at all in the face of
revolutions, strikes and economic collapse.

The main victim of total zombification by a wholly state-controlled media is
not the public. The public knows full well whether it is getting paid and
whether it can buy food with its wages. The main victims are the authorities
themselves who are losing their grip on reality and what is really going on
in the country.

The Moskovia channel, which belongs to Pugachyov, has already demonstrated
what kind of editorial policy the Orthodox banker would like to pursue. The
campaign launched by the station against Alexander Voloshin in no way differs
-- apart from in scale -- from the campaign against Anatoly Chubais unleashed
following the auction of Svyazinvest in 1997. In both cases, the television
stations with exceptional impudence and lack of ceremony put pressure not so
much on the public as on the authorities.

So if Pugachyov wants to advise the president on how he should act, he and
Father Tikhonov are quite enough. There is no need for television channels as
well.

Yulia Latynina is a journalist with ORT.

*******

#5
BBC Monitoring
Russia: Sarcastic TV6 head thanks Putin for "support" for journalists
Source: Ekho Moskvy radio, Moscow, in Russian 0318 gmt 22 Jan 02

[Presenter Aleksandr Andreyev] It is 0618 [0318 gmt] in Moscow. We continue
to discuss the situation with [opposition television channel] TV6.

[Omitted: known facts]

This is what TV6 general director Yevgeniy Kiselev told our radio station in
the way of comment on the situation. He also told us about ongoing
developments.

[Kiselev] TV6 broadcasting has been cut off. But it was too little for them.
Power was cut off to the studios and the technical equipment rooms. The
Internet does not work, I mean the internal [computer] network [providing an
access to the Internet]. We do not receive the news agencies' output.
Moreover, our signal is not transmitted via satellite. Therefore, more than
100 of our regional partners, independent television companies each having
its own broadcasting licence, are not receiving our programmes. The licence
withdrawn on the media minister's order was issued for broadcasting in Moscow
and 20 other cities in which branches of the MNVK [Moscow Independent
Broadcasting Corporation] company were working. It had nothing to do with the
regions in relation to which we were only a supplier of programmes.
Independent television companies received them by their own choice and
re-broadcast on the basis of their own licences. Now they have lost the
signal as well.

According to the information I have by now, our transmitting company
Set-Service which is absolutely independent from us and transmits our signal
to the international satellite LMI is receiving phone calls from some people
who probably are officers of some security agencies. They say that OMON
[special-purpose police] will come if they do not stop transmitting our
signal to the satellite. I do not know whether it is true but the signal is
not sent to the satellite.

This is an actual picture. It reminds me of a television coup. I do not rule
out that [TV6 staff] entrance permits [to the Ostankino television centre]
will be cancelled tomorrow morning. I will not be surprised if TV6
journalists will be simply barred from entering Ostankino tomorrow.

This is how the state supports us. I have a report in front of me, I found it
on purpose.The official news agency RIA reported from Paris on 15 January
that President Vladimir Putin said during his visit to France that the state
would do everything possible to support the TV6 journalist team. Well, we see
this support today in all its glory. I think the authority has demonstrated
that they have only one goal: to shut us up.

Now we must understand the situation in detail. I am getting information by
telephone and in scraps. Maybe, not all of it is true. So far I have the
impression that they went further than the mere suspension of the licence. I
saw the documents received from the bailiffs today. There is no mention of an
Internet or electricity cutoff, or the disconnection of telephones in
Ostankino, or the stoppage of the signal transmission via the LMI satellite.

*******

#6
Date: Tue, 22 Jan 2002
From: Laura Belin <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: query related to TV-6

I heard on the BBC Russian Service today (January 22)
that although NTV Plus sports channel started
broadcasting temporarily on the frequency used by TV-6
in Moscow, the same was not true in many cities across
the Russian Federation where local stations had signed
contracts to rebroadcast TV-6 programming.

It is not clear whether TV-6 will be able to resume
broadcasts on those stations soon. As far as I
understand, losing the license to use Channel 6 should
not affect whether TV-6 staff can produce programs for
local stations whose broadcast licenses are not in
dispute.

I would like to hear from JRL readers in Russia about
what programs (if any) they can watch on the channels
that used to carry TV-6 shows. For instance, a BBC
correspondent said that in St. Petersburg, the channel
that had previously rebroadcast TV-6 started showing
Swan Lake today after TV-6 was switched off. (As many
JRL readers will know, reruns of Swan Lake appeared on
Soviet television during the August 1991 coup.) Is
that true? Has NTV Plus offered its programming to
other stations that were rebroadcasting TV-6?

People can contact me directly at [log in to unmask]
if they would prefer not to post their comments to
JRL.

*******