Karachaevo-Cherkessian President has forbidden republican civil servants to communicate with media without permission of the presidential press service

KARACHAEVO-CHERKESSIA, 10 March, Caucasus Times. Sources in the Karachaevo-Cherkessian presidential administration told CaucasusTimes correspondent that Karachaevo-Cherkessian President Mustafa Batdyev issued instruction forbidding republican civil and municipal servants, including ministers and their deputies, to communicate with mass media without a special preliminary permission of the presidential press service. Representatives of the presidential press service do not consider this measure as a limitation of a freedom of speech.

Apart from that, according to presidential decree, all civil and municipal servants are obliged to subsribe to official republican print media outlets founded by the republican government and the parliament.

This decision has been made during the session at the presidential administration. Head of the Internal Policy Office of the Presidential Administration Andrei Gudimov informed the heads of all urban and rural municipalities about that decision by an official letter.

At present there are five official periodicals in Karachaevo-Cherkessia – newspaper “Den respubliki” and pring media outlets in the vernacular languages of the indigenous peoples of Karachaevo-Cherkessia such as “Karachai”, “Cherkes kheku”, “Nogai davysys” and “Abazashta” with the total circulation around 35 thousand copies.

It seems that dramatic drop in interest to those periodicals among the general population was the main reason for such a support to those media from the official authorities. Thus, only 12% of the population subscribed to the official republican newspapers.

Madina Botasheva, Cherkessk, Caucasus Times

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