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Analysis: Moscow Seen Trying to Influence Media in Russian Far East

Posted on: Monday, 18 July 2005, 12:00 CDT

Text of editorial analysis by Len Walker of BBC Monitoring Media Services on 18 July

Some months after a series of elections for governors in the Far East Federal District (FEFD), a council composed of managers and editors from the region has been formed by the presidential plenipotentiary to the FEFD.

Observers of the Russian media say that the content of local media reports on contentious issues such as the handover of islands to China, benefits reform and the division of powers between federal and regional government has seen the Kremlin increasingly unhappy that media sources overwhelmingly reflect regional, rather than federal, interests.

Regional administrations in the Far East Federal District are politically and economically powerful. With smaller urban populations, municipal authorities are economically, and therefore politically, weaker than counterparts in western Russia. Financial inducements, and use of administrative resources by regional administrations during the 1990s, have resulted in regional administrations obtaining levels of ownership in the majority of media sources, resulting in a largely compliant media.

These factors, as well as the lack of a developed advertising market, have seen political, rather than economic, interests exerting influence over media sources in the FEFD.

Khabarovsk is the federal centre of the FEFD, home of the presidential plenipotentiary and Far Eastern Military Command. During the economically-difficult 1990s the Khabarovsk Territory regional administration supported much of the local media.

This has led to a legacy of subsidy and dependency. The purchase of shareholdings by the regional administration has resulted in ownership of many media sources.

Of the three local television companies in Khabarovsk, GTRK (state television and radio broadcasting company) station DVTRK, Guberniya and Dal TV all broadcast programmes that support the regional administration.

Governor Ishayev appears frequently on Guberniya. Media observers note the station gives little airtime to the FEFD presidential plenipotentiary Konstantin Pulikovskiy, fearing that Ishayev would not approve.

The Khabarovsk regional budget allocates some 20m roubles (700,000 US dollars) annually for media support. This money is divided between DVTRK, the Tikhookeanskaya Zvezda (Pacific Ocean Star) newspaper and Guberniya television.

In the view of local editors, the Sakhalin Region administration press service has only to hint at what it wants reported from a largely compliant media. The press service has requested media sources to produce reports praising particular aspects of the administration's activities.

In Vladivostok, GTRK Primorye Television is the most popular station, and the regional authorities have a contract with it for the broadcast of information support on their behalf. Another local station, Public Television of Maritime Territory, was established by the regional administration.

Dal TV reported managers of media companies as saying that their news policy is determined by their founders, and if the owner of a newspaper, television channel or radio station believes that benefits reform harms people, the media will share the same opinion. Dal TV added that presidential plenipotentiary Konstantin Pulikovskiy believes journalists have not yet understood the essence of the reforms being made, and has stated that local media should be more restrained in certain statements. Media observers interpret this as an attempt to exert influence over news content carried by local media in the FEFD.

Pulikovskiy is the chairman of the newly-founded council. Sergey Pavlovich Bulakh, editor of the widely-read newspaper Vladivostok, Vladimir Vitalyevich Shvedchenko, the general director of state- owned GTRK Dalnevostochnaya TV and radio company, and Aleksandr Semenovich Drozdov, an aide to Pulikovskiy, were elected deputy chairmen.

Local media observers say that the council's decisions are made in advance. A transcript is reportedly produced from each council meeting and sent to the federal authority in charge of issuing licences to electronic media in Moscow, as well as the regional body for protecting press freedom and media in Vladivostok, which licenses print media.

Source: BBC Monitoring Media

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