NTV (Russia)

NTV (Cyrillic: НТВ) is a Russian television channel. As a subsidiary of Vladimir Gusinsky's company Media-Most,Viktor Shenderovich, "Tales From Hoffman" (sic) (48–57), Index on Censorship, Volume 37, Number 1, 2008, p. 50. it was a pioneer in the post-Soviet independent television media, but was later taken over by state-owned Gazprom.

History

Vladimir Gusinsky's company was founded in 1993 and attracted the best journalists and news anchors of the time: Tatiana Mitkova, Leonid Parfyonov, Mikhail Osokin, Yevgeniy Kiselyov, Vladimir A. Kara-Murza (father of Vladimir V. Kara-Murza), Victor Shenderovich and others. The channel set high professional standards in Russian television, giving live coverage and sharp analysis of current events. Its political puppet show Kukly ("Puppets"), had become a signature of the time when the freedom of speech was virtually unlimited. NTV was reputed for its news operation and popular entertainment programmes. In the late 1990s it ran prime-time news show Segodnya ("Today") with Mitkova and Osokin daily at 7 p.m and 10 p.m and weekly news commentary programme Itogi ("Summing up") with Kiselyov on Sundays at 9 p.m., both top-rated.

NTV was heavy on criticism of the Russian government, especially with respect to the First and Second Chechen Wars (even going as far as conducting interviews with...
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