MEDIA FREEDOM IN THE ELECTION YEAR

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 04 MOSCOW 002469 SIPDIS SIPDIS E.O. 12958: DECL: 05/24/2017 TAGS: KDEM PHUM PGOV SOCI RS SUBJECT: MEDIA FREEDOM IN THE ELECTION YEAR REF: 06 MOSCOW 2117 Classified By: Pol M/C Alice G. Wells. Reason: 1.4 (d). -------------- Summary -------------- ¶1. (C) The Kremlin or its well-wishers have been making erratic attempts to fine tune the press in an effort to ensure that the looming Duma and presidential elections go according to script. Ownership of key media by the government or by those friendly to it has been consolidated, a code of behavior has been introduced at one national wire service, and law enforcement has been used in an attempt to enforce a boycott on some opposition politicians or to close NGOs that work with the press. Meanwhile, internet newspapers continue to offer unvarnished versions of the news, some of the national printed press remains fairly free-wheeling, and the regional media is in places as vital as ever, while the more traditional source of information for a majority of the population --television-- generally offers Kremlin-friendly views of events. Uncertainty surrounding the looming succession will likely lead to increasingly concentrated attempts to exert further control as the year progresses. End summary. -------------- Changes in Media Landscape -------------- ¶2. (C) The preceding months have seen a series of unconnected actions by the GOR "wellwishers" that have in some cases arguably altered the media landscape for the worse and in others increased anxiety among those in the mass media. Some of the developments: -- In May, many members of the staff of the Russian News Service (RNS) quit in protest at what they describe as requirements to force them to concentrate their attention on the pro-Kremlin United Russia party, members of the officialy-sanctioned Public Chamber, official human rights activists Ombudsman Vladimir Lukin and Chairwoman of the Presidential Council for Human Rights Ella Pamfilova, while ignoring "Other Russia" opposition figures Mikhail Kasyanov, Eduard Limonov, Garry Kasparov, and "unofficial" human rights activists. According to the daily Kommersant, the Service's editorial staff has allegedly been told that its motto is "America is Our Enemy." According to Gallup, as many as eight million Russian-speakers comprise RNS's audience. -- On April 18, representatives of the Department of Economic Security confiscated the financial documents and computer servers of the Educated Media Foundation, the successor to Internews Russia, allegedly as part of an investigation sparked by a failure by EMF's President and one other employee to properly declare currency they were bringing into Russia in January. The confiscations effectively ended the work of EMF, an NGO that since 1992 has trained more than 15 thousand media professionals and provided invaluable assistance to the estimated 1,500 companies that broadcast to local audiences across Russia's eleven time zones. -- The Prosecutor General's (PG) office has on three occasions required that Gazprom-owned radio station Ekho Moskvy provide transcripts of comments that it thought may have contravened the law on extremism. Transcripts of Ekho interviews with Garry Kasparov and Eduard Limonov, both members of the anti-Kremlin umbrella group "Other Russia," have been requisitioned. More worryingly, the PG's office has also demanded a transcript of comments made by Ekho journalist Yuliya Latynina. A finding that Latynina had violated the law on extremism would at a minimum have a chilling effect on the station and could, if repeated, have implications for its broadcasting license. -- In August 2006, Gazprom subsidiary director Alisher Usmanov bought national daily of record Kommersant (reftels). There was no immediate, discernible change in the newspaper's content until January 2007, when Kommersant's editorial page disappeared, allegedly to allow the paper to parry pressure by the Kremlin to place opinion pieces espousing official positions. Subsequent months have seen the newspaper's coverage become at times more tendentious, for example with a front-page article attacking the USG's Supporting Human Rights and Democracy report. Still, Kommersant continues to provide largely unvarnished coverage of, for example, the activities of the anti-Kremlin "Other Russia" organization and Viktor Gerashchenko's dead in the water presidential campaign. -- In April, the investment company Abros, a subsidiary of MOSCOW 00002469 002 OF 004 the Petersburg-based bank Rossiya, which is controlled by President Putin's Petersburg confederate Yuriy Kovalchuk, acquired controlling interest of the national network REN-TV. REN-TV's not very adventurous news broadcasts have not been affected by the takeover to date, but the ownership re-shuffle sparked rumors that REN-TV was to be brought to heel. -- In March, Radio Russia fired journalist Irina Vorobyova after she discussed the Other Russia-sponsored "March of Dissent" on an Ekho Moskvy program that featured as well United Civil Front Chairman Garry Kasparov. Vorobyova was reportedly told by Radio Russia management that she was being fired because of her "lack of loyalty to the station." -- An amended law on extremism has made media, particularly in the regions, much more careful in their coverage of election campaigns. -- The Kremlin has parlayed financial problems at the independent weekly magazine Profil into a change in the magazine's editorial staff. Pro-American Editor Georgiy Bovt has been replaced with his polar opposite, Mikhail Leontiev, of Channel One's "However" program. Bovt told us that he expects most of his staff to either be sacked or depart voluntarily when Leontiev takes over at the beginning of June. Kremlin unhappiness with Profil had been expressed more frequently and pointedly since the beginning of the year, Bovt said. -- On the week of May 14, the national television network NTV continued its drift away from providing news, a process begun three years ago when Vladimir Kulistikov became General Director. The 2200 news program is now shown at 2245, and the day's events are reviewed only very briefly and at great speed. NTV's well-regarded Thursday program "To The Barrier," which features debates on topical issues between generally well-known public figures has been shortened by twenty minutes. Andrey Malkov's higher-rated weekly program, "Extraordinary Events," has recently featured tendentious documentary films on the anti-Kremlin umbrella group "Other Russia," Mikhail Khodorkovskiy ("The Man From Yukos"),and alleged connections between exiled oligarch Boris Berezovskiy and Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko. -------------- Observers Present Different National Pictures -------------- ¶3. (C) Conversations with journalists, media observers, and other contacts over the last few weeks suggest that the media are falling under ever closer scrutiny as the succession year progresses. While some, like owner and editor of the independent daily Nezavisimaya Gazeta Konstantin Remchukov, maintain that they are free to publish whatever they like, and have no contact with the Kremlin. Others, like outgoing Profil Editor Bovt, tell us that their publication has been under a microscope since at least January. ¶4. (C) Bovt reported he had been regularly counselled by Presidential Administration Deputy Vladislav Surkov or others in Surkov's office on his magazine's content. Surkov had asked Bovt why Profil had not joined the Russian national media attack on the Department's Supporting Human Rights and Democracy Report or criticism of the Estonian government in the wake of its decision to relocate its Soviet World War II liberation monument. A Profil article suggesting in the wake of the suppressed Other Russia meetings that demonstrators should be allowed to demonstrate caused much unhappiness in the Kremlin, said Bovt, as did a longer article on Other Russia's "March of Dissent." Remchukov, on the other hand, noted that his newspaper publishes pieces critical of the Kremlin and, as in a recent article on the legal problems of the appointed governor of Amur Region, of Putin himself. ¶5. (C) Bovt alleged to us that all media are being watched carefully by a nervous Kremlin as the succession year progresses. The scrutiny, Bovt said, extends to close textual analysis. A colleague at the large-circulation national daily Rossiiskaya Gazeta had told him recently of an angry telephone call from Surkov complaining of a phrase in an article that had Prime Minister Fradkov "ordering" First Deputy Prime Minister Dmitriy Medvedev to do something. "Fradkov," Surkov allegedly instructed, "cannot 'order' Medvedev." ¶6. (C) Ekho Moskvy Editor Aleskey Venediktov told us the media environment has worsened measurably over the last year, and that his station no longer enjoys its previous "privileged status" as the channel of dissent. It is more difficult to secure government guests. Anonymous threats MOSCOW 00002469 003 OF 004 directed at Venediktov have increased, and the internal power struggle in the Kremlin translates into minute scrutiny of progamming details. When "Just Russia" party leader Sergey Mironov was interviewed in connection with NATO developments, the Kremlin called, asking "Why not United Russia leader Gryzlov?" -------------- The Kremlin's Sliding Scale -------------- ¶7. (C) Daily reading of the national newspapers Kommersant, Nezavisimaya Gazeta, Izvestiya, Vedomosti, Novaya Gazeta, Moskovskiy Komsomolets, and Rossiiskaya Gazeta and scans of the weekly magazines Kommersant Vlast, The New Times, Profil, Itogi, and Russian Newsweek over the past several months suggest that the Kremlin's calculus, if there is one, may be selective and situational. Circulation, readership, subject matter, and personality seem to be to varying degrees important, as is the way that any purported criticism is handled. Novaya Gazeta (NG) and The New Times feature the most searing criticism of the GOR. NG's adroit, connected half-owner (Duma Deputy and businessman Aleksandr Lebedev), its relatively small circulation, and modest (twice-weekly) publication schedule may explain its survival. The weekly New Times is small in circulation as well and was launched only in January. Venediktov told us that its scorching criticism of the GOR has made it a "must read" in the Kremlin and that the Presidential Administration directed that Business Russia hire Olga Romanova as Editor, rather than let her join New Times' coterie of reporters. ¶8. (C) Although it is true, as Remchukov maintains, that pointed articles appear in Nezavisimaya Gazeta; Nezavisimaya, Izvestiya and Vedomosti often confine their criticism to longer pieces that avoid the names of prominent government personalities. The articles generally focus instead on "Russia's" problems, as in a recent, full-page Izvestiya piece by Merkator President Dmitriy Oreshkin that compared Russia's recent economic and social development unfavorably to that of Estonia and Germany. The newspapers manage to make the point that Russia's over-reliance on raw materials, staggering levels of corruption, and troubled demographic picture are the product of government policies without criticizing the principle government actors by name. ¶9. (C) The national daily Moskovskiy Komsomolets (MK) produces good, critical journalism for the masses (its daily circulation is two and one-half million). Possibly providing protective coloration are Editor Pavel Gusev, who has a slot on the establishment Public Chamber, and one of MK's key journalists, Aleksandr Khinshteyn, who is a Duma deputy with a background in the intelligence services. The paper leavens its pointed criticism of the GOR with Russian patriotism and cloaks the results in a nearly-impenetrable format. -------------- Observers Worry About the Internet -------------- ¶10. (C) Liliya Shibanova, Director of the NGO Golos, tended in a recent conversation to see the authorities' interventions as selective and the result imperfect if compared to the sweeping censorship that existed during the Soviet period. Driving the Kremlin, she thought, was an calculation that involved achieving the desired outcome with a minimum of outrage, although she acknowledged that the looming succession could make the authorities willing to sacrifice outrage to outcome. With central television news, the chief source of information for most Russians, firmly under control, Shibanova thought it made little sense to focus on the printed media. Shibanova guessed, however, that the same impulse that caused the crackdown on the handful of Other Russia demonstrators was behind the urge to control the less influential media, as well. The approach of the presidential succession would only exacerbate this tendency, she thought. ¶11. (C) Director of the Center for Journalism in Extreme Situations Oleg Panfilov tended to be, if anything, more pessimistic than Shibanova. Panfilov claimed that key internet news sites were already under pressure. He noted that Gazprom and Kommersant's Alisher Usmanov had purchased gazeta.ru, and claimed to have detected a resultant change in the tenor of its coverage. Oleg Buklemishev of ex-Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov's Popular Democratic Union agreed that gazeta.ru had become less bold. He pointed to its treatment of the latest twist in the Litvinenko assassination scandal as evidence. MOSCOW 00002469 004 OF 004 -------------- Comment -------------- ¶12. (C) The inroads on the media, although significant, have been uneven and largely situational. The authorities' sensitivity to any attempt to distract them as they manage the --for them-- perilous succession process will likely usher in an even more overdetermined media landscape by the time the official presidential campaign begins in January. BURNS