RFE/RL Caucasus Report Vol. 6, No. 11, 13 March 2003

Kremlin seeks to tighten control over Chechen media.

At the behest of Russian presidential envoy to the South Russia Federal District Viktor Kazantsev, a new Coordinating Council for Information Policy has been established in Chechnya, "Nezavisimaya gazeta" and "Kommersant-Daily" reported on 13 March. The council is headed by deputy Chechen administration head Tauz Dzhabrailov and also includes Chechen Deputy Prime Minister and Press Minister Beslan Gantemirov and Russian Deputy Media Minister Vladimir Kozlov. According to "Nezavisimaya gazeta," the primary task of the new council is to ensure more positive media coverage, both within Chechnya and in the Russian media in general, of developments in Chechnya, first and foremost the planned 23 March referendum on a new draft constitution.

Maksim Fedorenko, who heads the directorate for information and analysis within Kazantsev's staff, told the council's first session on 12 March that the Chechen media are still being revived and that they "make mistakes." It is not clear whether this criticism was directed primarily at Gantemirov, who over the past three years has on two occasions crossed swords with Chechen administration head Akhmed-hadji Kadyrov (see "RFE/RL Caucasus Report," 20 July and 15 September 2000).

Kadyrov has made no secret of his aspiration to the Chechen presidency. But in an interview published last December in the weekly official Chechen paper "Vesti respubliki," Gantemirov affirmed that he and no one else will determine the outcome of the presidential and parliamentary elections that will take place once the new constitution has been adopted. The question thus arises: Is the coordinating council intended partly to ensure that Gantemirov does not manipulate the Chechen media to that end? (Liz Fuller)