The following is a statement of the Russian Press Freedom Support Group, representing six international free press organizations that visited Russia July 10-13. CPJ vice-chair Terry Anderson and CPJ Europe program coordinator Emma Gray were members of the delegation. The statement was presented by World Press Freedom Committee Chairman James H. Ottaway, Jr., at a July 13 press conference in the House of Journalists in Moscow.

The 11 delegates in our Russian Press Freedom Support Group represent six of the leading international free press organizations with worldwide memberships. The delegates come from eight different countries of Western and Central Europe, the Middle East and North America.

We are in Moscow at the invitation of the Russian Union of Journalists and the Glasnost Defense Foundation, to support them in their struggle for freedom of speech for all Russians, and freedom of the press for all journalists and anyone who publishes a newspaper, magazine, or Internet news site and anyone who operates a television or radio broadcast company.

We are here to tell you that the world is watching Russia in its struggle to build a democratic society and a free press.

As President Putin said in his remarkable state of the nation speech on July 8, "Censorship and interference in the activities of the media are prohibited by law. Without truly free media, Russian democracy will simply not survive."

In talks over the past few days with journalists and government officials, politicians and ordinary citizens, we have confirmed our concern that President Putin's stated goals are far from the reality in Russia today.

There is widespread interference in the media by government officials in Moscow and even more so in the regions. And there is not a truly free and independent media in Russia today.

The Russian Union of Journalists estimates that 80 per cent of the print and broadcast news media in Russia is controlled directly or indirectly by the Federal government or the 89 regional governments or other local authorities. Instruments of control are: unequal subsidies needed for media survival, and use of the government's power to grant broadcast licenses, newsprint, access to government printing presses, and the government-controlled press distribution system.

We see four major threats to press freedom and independent journalism in Russia today.

One is government attempts to control the press with new information security policies, and intimidation of opposition media with selective, politically motivated criminal prosecutions and tax-enforcement raids against media that question government policy.

The second threat comes from government and oligarch media owners in Moscow and the regions, who use their own broadcast stations and publications to attack enemies and competitors and report favorably only about their own political candidates.

The third threat to freedom of the press and independent, honest, objective journalism is the lack of high standards of ethics and professionalism in the news media. If the media are to claim their vital place in building a free and democratic society, they must be worthy of that standing.

Publishers and journalists themselves need to set higher ethical standards and to demonstrate greater concern for the public interest and the common good.

The fourth threat is the lack of an economic environment to create the financial independence needed by the news media.

We urge the Putin government and the Russian people to see their own self-interest and national benefit in building and safeguarding a truly free and independent press.

A free flow of information is essential for a successful free market economy; and for foreign and Russian confidence to invest in public and corporate loans, the stock market and new businesses.

A free flow of ideas and opinions is essential to development of democracy in Russia, to a truly functioning political party system in which every candidate, every elected official, every party can state their positions and arguments to the public via a free and independent press.

Now, we want to present our list of government actions that intimidate journalists who do not always agree with government policy and that threaten freedom of the press in Russia. It is the same list that we have presented to the Russian officials we have met. That list shows that there is a contradiction between the good public statements and reality.

Actions speak louder than words!

Russian Press Freedom Support Group


Committee to Protect Journalists, New York City

Terry Anderson, CPJ Executive Board Member; Professor, Ohio University; former Senior Correspondent of the Associated Press

Emma Gray, CPJ Europe Program Coordinator; former producer at Moscow bureau of Independent Television News of London; Russian studies and language specialist

International Federation of Journalists, Brussels

August Glattfelder, IFJ Senior Vice President; Chairman of the Works Council of Suedwestrundfunk Baden-Baden, Germany

International Federation of the Periodical Press (FIPP), London

Per Mortensen, FIPP President and Chief Operating Officer

Lodewijk Croonen, President of the European Magazine Publishers Federation, Brussels

International Press Institute, Vienna

Piotr Niemczycki, IPI Executive Board Member; Publisher, Gazeta Wyborcza, Warsaw

World Association of Newspapers, Paris

Mikhail Klima, WAN Vice President; Managing Director of the newspaper Economia; President of the Czech Publishers Association, Prague

Gebran Tueni, WAN Board Member and Special Advisor on Middle East Affairs; Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of the newspaper An Nahar, Beirut

Ali Hamade, Editor-in-Chief, An Nahar, Beirut

World Press Freedom Committee, Washington

James H. Ottaway Jr., WPFC Chairman; Senior Vice President of Dow Jones & Co. (publishers of the Wall Street Journal) and Chief Executive Officer of Ottaway Newspapers regional group

Ronald Koven, WPFC European Representative; former Washington Post Foreign/Diplomatic Editor; former Boston Globe Foreign Correspondent.