Union of Right Forces leaders (left to right) Leonid Gozman, Nikita Belykh, Viktor Nekrutenko and Boris Nadezhdin
Photo: Dmitry Lekay
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State TV News "Covers" the Opposition
The Union of Rights Forces has become the main target of attack by state television channels Rossiya and Channel One in the last two weeks since election campaigning officially began and URF spokesmen began criticizing the government, the United Russia Party and Russian president Vladimir Putin personally. URF leader Boris Nemtsov and rightist politician Nikita Belykh have been outspoken on television debates.
The government response was quick in coming, with television news stories directed against the party. Immediately after the debates of November 11, a series of negative stories concerning the party were shown that features politicians from competing parties. United Russia representative Andrey Isaev was particularly adamant in that coverage, blaming the rightists for the 1998 financial crisis in the country and calling URF campaigning “a shameless deception and the dirtiest politics” without justifying that characterization. On a newscast an hour later, Patriots of Russia spokesman Gennady Semigin and host Mikhail Leontyev called the URF “traitors.” Just Russia leader Sergey Mironov and LDPR chief Vladimir Zhirinovsky also took part in coverage of the URF.
On the following weekend, former URF members were interviewed on television news. They talked about buying votes for 100-200 rubles and pensioners complained about not receiving the money they were promised in exchange for their votes. The party was compared to “the Jehovah's Witnesses cult.” Belykh was given the opportunity on News of the Week to deny “network marketing” campaign tactics, but he was followed by political scientist Dmitry Orlov, who spoke once again about the URF “deception of the voters.” No URF representatives have appeared on Channel One news broadcasts. It ended one segment on the party with an interview with a war veteran who said that “The desire of certain parties to return to power gives me dyspepsia.”
www.kommersant.com
All the Article in Russian as of Nov. 21, 2007
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