NTV journalists 'steal' rivals' jobs

NTV journalists have been defecting from the station

Journalists from the Russian television station NTV have angered colleagues who accuse them of stealing their jobs following NTV's takeover by the state-dominated giant Gazprom.

Many of NTV's journalists, including the former boss Yevgeny Kiselyov, have taken up jobs at the TV6 station, causing a number of the original TV6 staff to resign.

Anna Pavlova: NTV journalists have taken TV6 jobs

"Essentially what these people feared so much on NTV and what they fled from there has happened here - they have failed to save their own home, so they have taken away ours," said news presenter Anna Pavlova - one of those who has quit.

The tycoon Boris Berezovsky, who owns a major stake in TV6, says he hopes to create a super-channel out of the two stations.

"It will be neither TV6 nor NTV any more," he said.

Extradition refused

NTV staff refused to recognise the Gazprom management, claiming that the takeover was an attempt by the Kremlin to stifle media freedom.

Gazprom insists the takeover was motivated by the need to recoup debts from tycoon Vladimir Gusinsky, who has a large holding in NTV.

Vladimir Gusinsky: Spain refused extradition

But Mr Gusinsky has announced that he intends to sell his shares in NTV as a result of the takeover and the subsequent staff walk-out.

"The company in its present shape an dwith the new management is not of any interest to me as a shareholder," he told Ekho Moskvy radio.

"It is obvious to me that after most of the journalists, who were "the face" of the company, left it NTV does not attract me in any way," he said.

Two other outlets of Mr Gusinsky's Media-Most empire were also hit this week when the leading newspaper Sevodnya was closed down, and staff at a news magazine, Itogi, were sacked.

But Mr Gusinsky managed to escape an attempt to bring him to Russia to face charges of fraud and embezzlement relating to Media-Most when a Spanish court rejected extradition charges against him on Wednesday.

Mr Gusinsky claims the charges against him are motivated by his media group's anti-government stance.

American condemnation

The takeover of NTV - Russia's last remaining independent national TV station - is causing increasing alarm internationally and the United States on Wednesday issued a sharp rebuke to the Russian authorities.

"The United States expresses its deep disappointment with setbacks suffered recently by independent media in Russia," State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said.

"These actions lead reasonable observers... to the conclusion that the campaign against Media-Most is politically motivated, given the media company's often outspoken criticism of the Russian government's policies," he said.

But Russian officials rejected the comments, saying the media's problems were entirely commercial.