Kommersant
(Cyrillic: Коммерса́нтъ, literally "The
Businessman") is a commerce-oriented newspaper published in
Russia
. , the circulation was 131,000.
The newspaper was initially published in 1909, and it was closed
down following the
Bolshevik seizure of
power and the introduction of censorship in 1917.
In 1989, with the onset of press freedom in Russia, Kommersant was
re-established under the ownership of businessman and publicist
Vladimir Yakovlev.
To make the point that the publication had outlasted the Soviet
regime, "Kommersant" is spelled in Russian with a terminal
hard sign (ъ) – a letter that is silent at the end of a
word in modern Russian, and was thus abolished by the
post-revolution
Russian
spelling reform. This is played up in the Kommersant logo,
which features a script hard sign at the end of somewhat more
formal font.
In 1997, autos-to-Aeroflot mogul
Boris
Berezovsky – a member of the former President Boris Yeltsin's
'family' – bought the Kommersant publishing house, which included
Kommersant-daily, two serious weekly magazines (the
political
Kommersant-vlast (literally 'Power') and the
financial
Kommersant-dengi ('Money') – as well as
entertainment magazines
Domovoi and
Avtopilot and
Molotok, a teen magazine, whch later incurred the
authorities' wrath.
Berezovsky sacked Kommersant's director-general, Andrei Vassiliev,
and editor-in-chief, Alexander Stukalin, on
14
July 2005 in a move widely seen as
preparation for the 2008
Russian presidential
elections.
In January 2005, Kommersant published blank pages as a protest at a
court ruling ordering it to publish a denial of a story about a
crisis at
Alfa Bank. The sole article in
the paper was this one, published upside down, on the front page.
The headline of the article was "Full Plaintiff" (полный истец)
which has little meaning, but rhymes with a
Russian swear word, meaning "complete disaster"
(полный пиздец). The English version of the article was headed
"Alfa-d Up".
London resident Berezovsky sold the Kommersant publishing house to
an old friend and business partner, Georgian fruit canner and
opposition television station owner
Badri Patarkatsishvili, who was
already chairman of the Kommersant company's board.
In August 2006,
Patarkatsishvili sold his 100% stake
in the Kommersant publishing house to
Alisher Usmanov, head of Gazprom's
Gazprominvestholding subsidiary. Uzbekhistan-born Usmanov, thought
to have close ties with the Kremlin, had paid about $200 million
for the publishing house – and splashed out a further $30 million
in November 2006 buying the
Gazeta.ru web
news portal from Sekret Firmy Publishing.
After clashing with Usmanov, Kommersant editor-in-chief Vladislav
Borodulin quit. "[Borodulin’s] decision to resign wasn't forced,
but evidently they expressed different views on how the publishing
house should be developed," said the group's commercial director.
Andrei Vasilyev, appointed for a second stint at the helm of the
daily – after a long run from 1999 to 2005– said
Kommersant-daily had no intention of following any imposed
policy, and added that the edition would carry articles that might
not please the owner.
Kommersant remains somewhat of a rarity in President
Vladimir Putin's Russia. In March 2007 a
newly created press watchdog,
Rosokhrankultura, warned the paper that it
should not mention the
National
Bolshevik Party because the authorities had denied the
ultranationalist party official registration.
no new articles have been added to the English version of the website.
Since February 2009 Kommersant newspaper is printed and distributed
in the United Kingdom.
In May 2009, a Russian MP and prominent businessman
Oleg Mikheyev has sued the Kommersant for $217
million claiming that one of the newspaper's article "spoiled of
his bank so badly it had to be sold at disadvantageous
price".
In January 2000, Kommersant was found guilty of libel against
Russian entrepreneur
Alex Konanykhin
and ordered to pay compensation of US$3,000,000.
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