Sergey Snegov: NTV journalists’ money accounted. The prosecutors are satisfied

RF General State Prosecutor’s Office completed investigation into the case of NTV credits. The Prosecutor General Vladimir Ustinov has stated that he does not have any claims against the journalists. The State Prosecutor’s Office did not find corpus delicti in the fact of receiving of credits. Thus, “the case of credits” is over. The prosecutors scarcely believed that any signs of unlawful activity would be found about the fact that Media-Most had given credits to its employees. NTV journalist had really failed to pay out taxes from the mentioned sums of money, and the sums themselves had not been recorded in an account book. However such things are often being practised in Russia, and tax departments, but not the State Prosecutor’s Office, usually investigate such cases. The fact of the promulgation of the amounts of credits, received by NTV journalists for “improvement of housing conditions” is the only result of the prosecutors’ actions. The sums are large, and their promulgation is a scandal. As a result, “patriotic” press obtained a new reason to accuse “democratic” mass media of corruptibility. The community has been discussing Kiselev’s and Sorokina’s thousands of dollars within a week. One could say that this incident can just give a profit to NTV. One could regard it as a NTV PR campaign. But one should not forget that Russian mentality differs from the western one. In the opinion of ordinary Russian people Kiselev and his fellows used be victims of the new authorities. Now they turned into fastidious rich man. Thus “the case of credits” is really over. What next? As they say in Russia, man of sense will understand.