GEORGIA: Media tycoon Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation has bought a Georgian media company

Media tycoon Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation has bought a Georgian media company. U.S.- based News Corporation has bought a Georgian opposition media company. At a news conference in the Georgian capital Tbilisi on Wednesday (October 31), a News Corporation executive confirmed the deal, saying Georgian tycoon Badri Patarkatsishvili had sold his 51 percent stake in Imedi holding, which includes a television station, a newspaper and a news agency, to News Corp. "I came specifically today because of Badri asked us if we would be willing to if he executed a power of attorney to take over very broad powers in terms of his shares in the company," News Corporaton's Executive Vice President Martin Pompadur told reporters "We've known Badri both personally and business wise for many years and we said "yes"," he added. Earlier, Patarkatsishvili -- who said this week he would finance Georgian opposition parties -- confirmed to Russia's Interfax news agency that he had sold his stake in Imedi holding. News Corporation, run by media tycoon Rupert Murdoch, acquired a 49 percent stake in Imedi last year. Georgia's media is dominated by the government and the opposition considers the Imedi television station as its main outlet to the public. The fragmented opposition has recently regrouped into a loose coalition calling for the resignation of Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili on charges of corruption, accusations he has dismissed. A series of rallies around Georgia culminate in a mass demonstration in the capital Tbilisi on Friday (November 2). Murdoch and Patarkatsishvili are known to be on friendly terms and Patarkatsishvili hinted that the deal was less about business and more about keeping Imedi out of his politics. In a recent interview on Imedi TV, Patarkatsishvili hinted that he planned to sell his Imedi media stake. ".....If I decide to get involved in politics - I know what to do - I will hand my shares of the TV company to another entity, so then nobody can accuse it of interfering in Georgia's political life. So, it is all very simple," he said. Patarkatsishvili fled Russia to his native Georgia in 2000 after Russian authorities accused him of fraud. The magnate, an ally of exiled Kremlin arch-foe Boris Berezovsky, has said the charges were politically motivated.

ITN Source | November 2, 2007

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