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MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russian security police swooped on Russia's
independent Echo of Moscow radio station on Monday, a day before
French President Jacques Chirac was to give a live interview on
its airwaves.
The raid could add the issue of press freedom to other uncomfortable
topics including Yugoslavia and Chechnya that are surfacing during
one of the more awkward visits President Vladimir Putin has hosted.
In a prepared speech Chirac delivered to students at Moscow State
University on Monday, he said one of the state's main responsibilities
was guaranteeing free expression.
The influential news radio station, the last independent remnant
of self-exiled media baron Vladimir Gusinsky's empire, has been
struggling to avoid a takeover by the state-dominated natural
gas monopoly Gazprom.
Over the past three months, Gazprom has taken over Gusinsky's
NTV, shut down his Sevodnya newspaper and sacked the staff of
his Itogi magazine. But Echo of Moscow has held out, its staff
hoping to persuade the gas company to sell it enough additional
shares to keep it independent.
Echo of Moscow's web site quoted founder Alexei Venediktov as
saying prosecutors and officials from the FSB special police had
visited the station's office to seize shares worth 14 percent
of the station, which Gusinsky gave to the station's staff in
May.
General Prosecutor's office spokesman Leonid Troshin told Reuters
the move was part of a criminal case against Gusinsky.
"Nobody has closed the case," he said. "He gave
the journalists something that may not have belonged to him. We
need to sort this out."
Gusinsky is wanted in Russia on charges of fraud and money laundering,
which he says were trumped up to strip him of control of his media
empire and silence his criticism of Putin.
The Kremlin says the case has nothing to do with politics and
accuses Gusinsky of taking huge loans from Gazprom with no plans
to pay them back. He was jailed in Spain on a Russian warrant,
but freed this year after a Spanish court ruled the case against
him was not extraditable.
INFLUENTIAL VOICE
Echo of Moscow has been one of the most influential parts of
Gusinsky's empire.
Last year, U.S. President Bill Clinton appeared on the station
and spoke at length about free speech, an act seen as a gesture
of support for Gusinsky as his troubles were mounting.
German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder gave an interview to Echo
of Moscow earlier this year, but British Prime Minister Tony Blair
cancelled an appearance on the station at the last minute, earning
scathing comment from British newspapers.
Putin's relationship with Chirac is perhaps his least comfortable
with any major Western leader. France has until recently been
especially outspoken in criticising Russia over alleged human
rights abuse in Chechnya, and Chirac's visit was also marred by
disagreement over Yugoslavia.
Echo of Moscow's staff hopes the station can emerge as the only
Gusinsky media property to survive unscathed. The 14 percent share
stake Gusinsky gave to staff would bring the holding of the station's
journalists to 42 percent.
But Gazprom owns at least 25 percent, and another 25 percent
share held by Gusinsky's Media-Most firm is pledged to the gas
company as collateral for loans, giving it a potential majority.
The station quoted Venediktov as saying its staff had not yet
received the 14 percent share from Gusinsky because paperwork
on the gift deal had not been completed.
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