Russian liberal radio station sees off “censorship” move

(Interfax – May 27, 2016)

A dispute about freedom of speech at the Ekho Moskvy radio station in Moscow seems to be resolved to the satisfaction of the journalists and with the editor-in-chief’s authority enhanced.

New contract and “censorship”

The argument began when talk show presenter Yevgenia Albats refused to sign a new contract that she said amounted to censorship. It was offered to her by Anna Pavlova, the general director appointed by the parent company, Gazprom Media, which is allied to the Kremlin although Ekho Moskvy is editorially independent. According to Albats, it required her to clear questions and discussion topics with Pavlova prior to going on air. (See “Russian radio show off air amid censorship concerns”, by BBC Monitoring on 25 May 2016).

In addition to her radio show, Albats is also proprietor of a magazine that is critical of the authorities.

Editor in chief steps in

But after intervention by the station’s editor-in-chief, Alexei Venediktov, Albats has now been offered a new deal without the contentious clauses, the privately-owned news agency Interfax reported on 27 May. “We’ve drawn up a new contract and removed all the censorship obstacles,” it quoted Venediktov as saying. “It’s been sent to Albats for signing and the decision is up to her.”

“He stressed that thanks to this situation he has regained, as editor-in-chief, the right to negotiate the contracts with journalists,” Interfax reported.

All the contracts since 2014 with freelancers that “they were forced to sign with the general director” will now be revisited and “some serious cleaning-up lies ahead”, Venediktov said. “As with Albats, we’ll take out all the censorship bits and have them signed anew”. Twelve people including other on-air names will be affected.

General director denies censorship charges

When Pavlova arrived in 2014, Venediktov continued, she and Gazprom Media “decided to exclude me from the process of negotiating contracts, which is against the law and our editorial charter”.

However, Pavlova denied the story as reported. “I know that (Albats) refused to sign the new contract although it was exactly the same as the previous one,” she said: both documents were “absolutely identical” and she did not understand what the problem was.