Interfax opened a new Internet portal "Religion"

On December 20, the International Information Group "Interfax" announced the opening of a new Internet portal "Religion" , which will host materials relating to various aspects of religious life in Russia and other countries.

"Without coverage of the religious sphere, it is difficult to talk about creating a holistic and objective picture of the life of our society. Therefore, we consider our new project as an important addition to the existing Interfax information products and, mainly, to the socio-political news feed," said the chief Alexei Meshkov, editor of the Interfax Political Information Service. He also noted: "The information posted on the Religion portal will be publicly available, which, we hope, will allow the portal to become the largest information platform in Russia and other CIS countries for the exchange of views between representatives of various religions." The creation of a new resource was welcomed by the Patriarch of Moscow and All Rus' Alexy II, the Chairman of the Council of Muftis of Russia Ravil Gainutdin, the Chief Rabbi of the country (FEOR) Berl Lazar.

As noted in the information message about the opening of the portal, "when developing the www.interfax-religion.ru project, all the requirements for modern users to resources of this kind were taken into account. In addition to news, the site will feature exclusive interviews and analytical materials, detailed monitoring of central, regional and religious print media, as well as a review of specialized Internet resources.

In addition, Interfax's new information portal will provide such a service as monitoring television and radio broadcasts. His other unique service will be Interfax's archive of all religious news, which has been maintained since 1989 and currently accumulates about 20,000 messages. The "Memorable Dates" section of the Internet portal will list the largest religious holidays and major biographical milestones of the leading spiritual leaders of Russia, the CIS and far-abroad countries.

On July 1, 2005, the opening of the English-language version of the portal was announced.

Sources

• "Interfax" announces the launch of the information Internet portal "Religion" // Interfax. 2004. December 20.
• "Interfax" announces the launch of the English version of the information Internet portal "Religion" // There. 2005. July 1st.