Moderators: Alyrium Denryle, Edi, K. A. Pital
How's this for starters?Stas Bush wrote:Another lie. Fucker, I said I disagree with Chechnya policy although it's not illegal... Liar.
And above all else, there is independent media in Russia. NTV was fucked but there is a shitload of programs and the TV6 which fuck ANYTHING Putin said...
I GOT TIRED OF LIES. Take some time, look what I say. Not just insult me like fgalkin did.
Freedom of the press my ass.The station's end was abrupt, with a blank screen and then a test pattern interrupting a talk show host in mid-sentence.
Russian officials also severed the station's electrical supply, as well as connections to telephone and Internet lines.
The move comes after a Moscow court decided Jan. 11 to liquidate TV6 after a minority shareholder accused the station of failing to turn a profit.
That shareholder, the pension fund Lukoil-Garant, owns a 15 percent stake in TV6. Lukoil-Garant is controlled by Russian oil giant Lukoil, which, in turn, is minority owned by the Russian government.
TV6 has the fourth-largest share of Russia's television audience, even though its broadcasts do not reach all of the country.
Seventy-five percent of TV6's shares are owned by Boris Berezovsky, a millionaire in self-imposed exile who is of the Russian government and President Vladimir Putin.
Last week, TV6's journalists voluntarily surrendered the station's broadcast license and formed a new company without Berezovsky to fight for transmission rights themselves.
But on Monday TV6 General Manager Yevgeny Kiselyov said the managers decided they hadn't had the right to surrender the broadcast license and only did so because of Kremlin pressure to drop Berezovsky.
"We were told: This your last chance. Take it or we in the Press Ministry will take you off the air," Kiselyov told The Moscow Times. "We trembled and lost our composure."
Kiselyov and his fellow managers said only the station's stockholders could officially hand over TV6's broadcast license.
Kremlin Media Minister Mikhail Lesin told The Moscow Times the decision to close TV6 was not related to the failed negotiations with station journalists. He said Lukoil-Garant was "not happy with the peace process" and had put pressure on the court to send bailiffs to begin the liquidation process.
http://www.therussiajournal.com/index.htm?obj=5321Aminority shareholder gets no dividends and suspects that the company has been manipulating assets without his knowledge. On learning that the company turns no profit, the shareholder asks the court to declare the company bankrupt.
This is a normal scenario, but what is not normal is when the minority shareholder receives a lucrative offer to sell his 15 percent stake for $10 million, but refuses and again asks the court to declare the company bankrupt.
Even more strange is when the minority shareholder offers to buy the majority shareholder's stake and then tries to bankrupt the company. And strangest of all is the minority shareholder's stubborn insistence on bankruptcy proceedings after stating that the majority shareholder's offer is laughable because the company is on the way up and will soon rake in profits and have a higher value. But if the court bankrupts the company, it becomes virtually worthless. So where is the logic?
If this were a dispute between shareholders in a factory or a bank, you could imagine the minority shareholder had some cunning plan. But in this case, there are no clever tricks in the wings, no logic and no business interest. Only politics.
The minority shareholder, a pension fund affiliated with oil giant LUKoil, got the political order from the Kremlin to liquidate TV company TV6, owned by exiled oligarch Boris Berezovsky. TV6 took in those members of the NTV team who quit the channel after its seizure in April, not wishing to work for the new owners.
Now, LUKoil is playing the role that Gazprom played in the NTV saga – that of battering ram and liquidator. But LUKoil has the simpler job, as it doesn't have to liquidate an entire wealthy and well-organized business, it merely has to eliminate a single TV channel. It has to make the blow fatal, but at the same time make it all look legal.
The old "dispute between two companies" pretext used in the NTV conflict doesn't work quite so well in this case, however. TV6 has no debts, its new management has boosted the channel's ratings and LUKoil turned down the offer to sell its stake. But these arguments fell on deaf ears in the court, which, as in the NTV case, has to observe political expediency in its decision.
In the TV6 case, the authorities look to be even less worried about the negative political and PR consequences than they were during the NTV case. President Vladimir Putin's new foreign policy course is much to the liking of his Western partners, and the Kremlin has some grounds for thinking that its support for the anti-Taliban operation gives it a free hand to do what it thinks necessary at home.
But the TV6 case might also have a nonpolitical consequence. LUKoil and the courts have resorted to a previously unused provision in the Civil Code to get TV6 closed. In Russia today, it would be possible to close almost every company in the country on the grounds that it showed no profit and zero revenue, even though it is working.
The thing is, Russian business has worked by the unwritten practice of hiding its money from excessive taxes by not showing profits, and the state has turned a blind eye to the practice, realizing that to do otherwise would give entrepreneurs no chance of survival. But now a precedent has been set that could give the state a powerful weapon against inconvenient businesses. And not only the state – this provision, which is theoretically useful but dangerous in the current Russian context, could also become a weapon in the hands of predatory businesses and could spark a whole new asset carve-up.
Another consequence is that the TV6 case and the whole Media-Most affair shows that Russia still does not have an independent judicial system. When Alfred Kokh was head of Gazprom-Media, the company that took over NTV, he notoriously said, "I can get any decision I need." And that is precisely what he did. The state made sure the courts ruled in Kokh's favor, even when it went against the facts and common sense.
One simple example: The tax inspectors took NTV to court on the grounds of the same Article 99 of the Civil Code used against TV6 and said, of course, that the case was purely economic. But the court refused to liquidate NTV, saying that a company that paid all its taxes couldn't be considered insolvent. But in the TV6 case, this argument hasn't worked, nor has the argument that the company has become profitable in the last few months. Now, TV6 has to be liquidated within a year.
TV6's management can appeal, but it's already obvious that with the Kremlin sticking to its guns, there's no chance of victory.
"The authorities have gone for the hard-line approach," said TV6 General Director Yevgeny Kiselyov at a press conference. "The decision to liquidate TV6 was taken in the Kremlin. We will appeal, but it's not the court that will decide the issue, it's the political leadership of the country. Our chances of survival are slim, but they are there."
"We feel a certain regret at this court decision," said Media Minister Mikhail Lesin. "We had thought that the upheavals on the media market were over, but it turns out not all the lessons are over. We hope that the shareholders will reach an agreement and settle this dispute peacefully. We will act only in accordance with the law. A frequency can be put up for tender either when a company's license expires, or for some other reason. So, it's hard to predict the future now. I'd like to see the court decision and, in accordance with it, look at the options."
Lesin's comments show a certain bewilderment, as if these latest events took the man responsible for the previous operation against Media-Most by surprise. Perhaps this suggests that Lesin is also on his way out and is being kept out of important decisions, or perhaps it's just that the state media-strangling machine is now on automatic pilot.
As for Lesin's words of regret and desire to see the court decision, this is just rhetoric. Attentive observers of the political scene now know full well that any channel can be taken off the air at any moment, and that the law allows it to happen. But for it to go ahead, Lesin has to get the order from the Kremlin. On condition of anonymity, one high-placed government official said a few days ago that this order would certainly come.
Commenting on the situation with the TV channel, the official said: "They will definitely close it. Maybe they won't even wait until the appeal is examined. The law allows this, it seems. They'll close it, but not before Dec. 1, because they want to see the how ‘Za Steklom' ends and find out who wins the apartment."
(The writer is a political correspondent for Yezhenedelny Zhurnal.)
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jh ... russ12.xmlThe case against TV6 was brought by LUKoil, Russia's largest oil company, which has close ties to the Kremlin. A major shareholder in TV6, LUKoil complained that the station was losing money.
But in recent months, TV6's ratings have soared to make it the second most popular station in Russia and it is back in profit.
However, the arbitration court ordered that it should be wound up regardless.
The Russian tycoon Boris Berezovsky, who owns three quarters of TV6, has been in self-imposed political exile since he chose to oppose President Putin shortly after his election.
TV6's closure brings to an end a Kremlin campaign to bring independent television stations to heel. The drive was launched immediately after Mr Putin took office in May 2000.
http://english.pravda.ru/main/2002/01/11/25322.htmlThe Moscow arbitration court decided to liquidate MNVK on the claim of one of the TV company’s shareholders – non-governmental pension fund LUKOIL-Garant. The claim originated from the fact that over the period of 1998-2000 the company’s assets were below the minimal rate fixed in the legislation. The verdict was also confirmed by the authority of appeal; a period of six months was determined for a liquidating procedure at the TV company.
I would get stomped if I were going to take a side firmly against fgalkin, however I didn'tEdi wrote:Vympel, sorry, you are going to get utterly stomped in this. Everything Fgalkin says sounds just like an echo of what we have been hearing here about the happenings in Russia from our own news media
Russia is working out very well for a country which spent most of the 20th century under a totalitarian regime. Putin's quasi-authoritarian democracy is continuing to help the country recover, at least, and as long as the electoral process isn't interferred with to the point that elections are rigged, I think things will turn out all right.Stuart Mackey wrote:Lol, Freedom of the press in Russia is a principle that goes to the highest bidder, or biggest gun. This has always been the case, its now a bit more obvious.
Going to take a long while, decades at the least.The Duchess of Zeon wrote:Russia is working out very well for a country which spent most of the 20th century under a totalitarian regime. Putin's quasi-authoritarian democracy is continuing to help the country recover, at least, and as long as the electoral process isn't interferred with to the point that elections are rigged, I think things will turn out all right.Stuart Mackey wrote:Lol, Freedom of the press in Russia is a principle that goes to the highest bidder, or biggest gun. This has always been the case, its now a bit more obvious.
Oh, I doubt Russia will have fully recovered before the beginning of the 22nd century.Edi wrote: Going to take a long while, decades at the least.
Edi
Your right, but as Edi said, it will take decades to get it right.The Duchess of Zeon wrote:Russia is working out very well for a country which spent most of the 20th century under a totalitarian regime. Putin's quasi-authoritarian democracy is continuing to help the country recover, at least, and as long as the electoral process isn't interferred with to the point that elections are rigged, I think things will turn out all right.Stuart Mackey wrote:Lol, Freedom of the press in Russia is a principle that goes to the highest bidder, or biggest gun. This has always been the case, its now a bit more obvious.
Indeed. The thing is that Russia has never really had a chance to develop what we take for granted. They must change their culture and thinking to benifit themselfs. How long did it take to have what the Anglo/Saxon nations have? centurys, fortunatly, the Russians have the benifit of our mistakes.The Duchess of Zeon wrote:Oh, I doubt Russia will have fully recovered before the beginning of the 22nd century.Edi wrote: Going to take a long while, decades at the least.
Edi
Sure, I don't deny that most of the media is less or more dependent on the government. So what? Does that mean no independent media exists? Brr...This has been the pattern for the past three years, it's useless to try to deny it, Stas.
And many other countries having same situation. So what? I don't believe completely neither Russian nor CNN and whosoever. Let's see who's more independent.to less than total (e.g. Russia)
I agree, considering that Russia has been autocratic at least since the time of Ivan the Great, and its only other attempt at democracy (Novgorod) quickly turned into an oligarchy. I heard estimates that only after three genearations had passed, will Russia have a chance to become a true democracy. The serf mentality is too deep in the Russians.The Duchess of Zeon wrote:Oh, I doubt Russia will have fully recovered before the beginning of the 22nd century.Edi wrote: Going to take a long while, decades at the least.
Edi
The press in the US and Canada is not being censored by the government. Media outlelts that are in opposition to the government are not being shut down or taken over. Local reporters don't get beaten, killed, or imprisoned for exposing the corrupt regimes of the local governors. There is a great difference between Russian press and American press.Ted wrote:Not many countries HAVE free press.
The US doesn't, Canada doesn't, the rest of the West doesn't.
In the US, the major press companies all fund the Presidential candidates, and these companies control most of the press there.
The same in Canada. There is about two or three companies who control the press in Canada, all have ties to the Government, either through funding campaigns, or previous stock holders now in government.
Longer. At least since the middle of Gorbachev's rule. Even good ol' Gorby was involved in censorship, and Yeltsin was worse. They did the same sort of shutting down of opposition channels. I would dare say there's never been a free press in Russia for longer than six months at a time. When the Communists fell from power, the politicians who took power were so afraid of losing it that they controlled the media to enhance their campaigns.Edi wrote:This has been the pattern for the past three years, it's useless to try to deny it, <snip>
Edi
BattleTech for SilCoreStanley Hauerwas wrote:[W]hy is it that no one is angry at the inequality of income in this country? I mean, the inequality of income is unbelievable. Unbelievable. Why isn’t that ever an issue of politics? Because you don’t live in a democracy. You live in a plutocracy. Money rules.
Maybe not like that, but American press is influenced by the US Government, in that the owners can be and are great friends of the regime.fgalkin wrote:The press in the US and Canada is not being censored by the government. Media outlelts that are in opposition to the government are not being shut down or taken over. Local reporters don't get beaten, killed, or imprisoned for exposing the corrupt regimes of the local governors. There is a great difference between Russian press and American press.Ted wrote:Not many countries HAVE free press.
The US doesn't, Canada doesn't, the rest of the West doesn't.
In the US, the major press companies all fund the Presidential candidates, and these companies control most of the press there.
The same in Canada. There is about two or three companies who control the press in Canada, all have ties to the Government, either through funding campaigns, or previous stock holders now in government.
Have a very nice day.
-fgalkin
