The Death of Free Television
Ten years on from the state’s forced takeover of NTV, Yevgeny Kiselyov, a former reporter at the station, mourns the loss of independent television in Russia, painting a picture of a previously rich news environment of healthy debate and satire. Kiselyov says that, despite thousands of protests to save NTV’s independence, the station was sacrificed to Vladimir Putin’s power vertical, which has since ‘destroy[ed] freedom of speech on television‘. From the Moscow Times:
Putin’s regime, having set out to build its notorious “power vertical,” could not afford the luxury of independent television station free from all state controls and broadcasting to the entire country. The government campaign to take over the network lasted almost two years, with the state bringing all of its resources and leverage to bear: courts, the Prosecutor General’s Office, the FSB, the Federal Tax Service, state-controlled media, propagandists and political consultants.