Removed for approximation

The Corruption Foundation deleted from the channel Alexei Navalny in YouTube video "Friend of Putin, who owns all television" On the billionaire Yuri Kovalchuk. This was reported by the author of the video, press secretary of Navalny Kira Yarmysh.

“Unfortunately, in my last video that all the large media in Russia belong to Putin Kovalchuk, actual mistakes crept out. That is, in fact, everything is true - the media really belong to Kovalchuk, but part of the information about the structure of ownership is outdated. Since it is important for us to maintain a high standard of correctness of information, I decided to delete the video. This topic is extremely interesting, I will not abandon it and make my videos about it. An apology and many thanks to everyone who pointed out mistakes, ”wrote Yarmysh.

The journalist of Vedomosti Ksenia Bolsk drew attention to errors in the video. She has listed seven statements that are either based on outdated data or are not true.

The video published on Thursday managed to gain more than a million views. It said that Kovalchuk, the chairman of the board of directors of the Russian Bank and a friend of Vladimir Putin, belongs to almost the entire domestic media business.

According to the FBK, in 2006, Kovalchuk bought a Leader company, which runs through the Gazfont, Gazprom's employees with pension savings. The Gazfonta itself owns the control package of Gazprombank, and the latter is the largest domestic media holding Gazprom -Media.

It was noted that through these assets a businessman can influence NTV TV channels, NTV Plus, TNT, TV3, 2 × 2, "Friday!" and cable network "Tricolor TV". In addition, Kovalchuk is controlled by the Echo of Moscow, Children's Radio, Comedy Radio, City FM, Relax FM, Autoradio, Energy, Romori FM and Publishing House Seven Days.

Kovalchuk, as well as other billionaires, Gennady Timchenko and the Rotenberg brothers, were included in Washington’s sanctions lists, one of the first - March 20, 2014, a few days after the annexation of Crimea Moscow. Sanctions suggest the ban on the oligarchs to enter the United States and the freezing of their assets in this country. Automatically fell under the sanctions and the banks belonging to them.

On May 23, 2014, Putin said that the people in respect of whom the West sanctions have been imposed have nothing to do with the situation in Ukraine. As the president emphasized, the sanctions touched his personal friends . “They chose, especially, two Jews and one Ukrainians,” Putin said about Rotenbergs and Timchenko. The president, after the introduction of American sanctions against Kovalchuk, defiantly opened a salary account at the Russian Bank.