"[Russian President Vladimir Putin's] doings are covered Soviet-style in minute detail in every broadcast," Nicholas Fraser reported in 2004. "...Russians may consult the internet and read about abuses of democracy throughout the world but it remains hard for them to know what is going on in their own country. 'I don't see why I can be accused of suppressing press freedoms,' Putin blandly tells a student at Columbia University. 'Russia has no history of such things.'"
["NTV, the last national television station to show any independence of spirit, has in effect been taken over by the state," The Economist reported in July 2004. "Its programme 'Freedom of Speech,' the only balanced political talk-show on Russian television, was given its final airing a few hours before (renegade journalist) Paul Klebnikov's killing. Neither has Russia become safer for journalists: 15 have now been killed since 2000. No one has been brought to book for any of their murders." In the Fraser Institute's 2004 "Economic Freedom" report, Russia ranked just above Congo-Brazzaville.]
Sources
Nicholas Fraser, Harper`s, May 2004, p. 57; The Economist, Jul 15th 2004
