MOSCOW ? The editor in chief of an influential Russian radio station recently rebuked by Prime Minister Vladimir V. Putin for its biting criticism of the Kremlin stepped down from the station?s board of directors on Tuesday after its government-controlled owners announced changes in the board?s membership, including the removal of its only two independent members.
The editor, Aleksei A. Venediktov, said that he would remain in charge of the newsroom at the station, Ekho Moskvy, but that he would not remain on the nine-member board. The authorities said that politics were not involved in the decision to reshuffle the board, but the shake-up at the station, which is controlled by Russia?s government-owned natural gas monopoly, Gazprom, nevertheless sent a chill through the journalistic world here.
?This is a signal, certainly,? Mr. Venediktov said in a special appearance on Ekho Moskvy on Tuesday. ?I don?t see anything catastrophic in this, but it is unpleasant and I certainly see this as an attempt to adjust editorial policy.?
Though the ramifications are unclear, the decision appeared to signal that the authorities would seek to keep a firm hand on the news media discourse in Russia as Mr. Putin prepares to run in a presidential election next month.
The question is, how firm? For months, Mr. Putin has been trying to come to terms with a growing protest movement whose size and influence seem to have thrown the rules governing how the news media cover government criticism into flux.
In December, the editor of a respected newsmagazine was fired for printing a photograph of an election ballot defaced with profanity directed at Mr. Putin. Yet critiques of his rule have begun to seep into even the most tightly controlled news outlets, including government-run television.
Unlike television, however, Ekho Moskvy has for years been given free reign to broadcast unfettered and often acerbic criticism of the Kremlin. Its audience of politically frustrated intelligentsia and urban middle class has been seen by the authorities as too small and inactive to present much of a threat ? until recently.
Lately, Ekho Moskvy has come to be an important resource for the nascent protest movement, which arose apparently in response to fraud in parliamentary elections in December and has since held three boisterous demonstrations against Mr. Putin, on Dec. 10, Dec. 24 and Feb. 4. The station has been hosting raucous debates among opposition leaders, many of whom were until recently barred from government-controlled television. Moreover, its Web site has become a platform for opposition agitprop culled from social media networks and YouTube.
On Tuesday the station posted a fake television news report showing a caged Mr. Putin in a Russian courtroom facing charges of money laundering and embezzlement, a dream development for many opposition activists here.
?This radio station is without a doubt a very important organ for opposition forces,? said Leonid Parfyonov, a well-known television journalist who has become a leader in the protest movement. ?Those forces that support Putin consider Ekho Moskvy to be too biased and not objective,? he said, adding, ?There is some basis for this, by the way.?
Last month at a meeting with prominent news editors, including Mr. Venediktov, Mr. Putin criticized Ekho Moskvy for ?pouring diarrhea? on him ?from morning till night.? He said he was particularly unsettled by coverage of foreign issues, accusing the station of being biased against Russia?s interests and positive about the United States on topics like missile defense and the 2008 war with Georgia.
?To serve the interest of Russia with respect to the United States in this way on a station belonging to a government company is unacceptable,? Mr. Putin said, visibly exasperated. ?And you talk about freedom of speech. Where is it if not in this? It?s indecent.?
Mr. Putin?s spokesman, Dmitri S. Peskov, denied that the changes to the board?s makeup was connected to the station?s criticism.
?It is no secret that Putin was and remains an object of criticism on that radio station,? Mr. Peskov told the Interfax news agency. ?But it is wrong to link in some way the internal corporate processes of Ekho Moskvy with criticism of Putin or fanaticize about the possibility of it being taken over.?
Gazprom?s media holding company, Gazprom Media, which holds a 66 percent stake in the station, also denied politics was involved, saying in a statement published by the RIA Novosti news agency that the reshuffle was scheduled to occur this summer as part of a companywide effort to populate its daughter companies with business managers rather than journalists.
But the statement added that Gazprom Media moved up the date of the reshuffle because of ?heightened attention given to the radio station recently by various parties.?
It did not explain who those parties were.
Along with Mr. Venediktov, two other Ekho Moskvy board members and two independent board members lost their positions. Ekho Moskvy employees, who hold the remaining 34 percent of the station?s shares, will have a say in the makeup of the new board, but Mr. Venediktov said he feared that Gazprom Media?s influence over board decisions would increase.
Ekho Moskvy journalists, who published a statement to the station?s Web site, said they were ?perplexed? by the decision, but added, ?We understand that Gazprom Media had to respond to the criticism of the radio station by high-ranking Russia officials.?
Source: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=04b7c9b62e437164283e2a45ce024523
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