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Putin urges regional heads to cease spending on image campaigns in media

"It is not good when money from the budget is used for PR-campaigns, actually to promote the image of particular persons and officials," the president said

MOSCOW, June 23. /TASS/. Russian President Vladimir Putin urged regional authorities on Tuesday to eradicate the practice of spending budget funds on improving their image in the media.

Putin, who spoke at a meeting of Russia’s Public Chamber, said such expenditures must be cut.

"It is not good when money from the budget is used for PR-campaigns, actually to promote the image of particular persons and officials and this actually means misspending and it is necessary to find a formula that would prevent the practice of spending money, which could be used to resolve social issues, in particular, for the construction of kindergartens, on PR-actions," the president said.

At the same time, the Russian president said regional authorities should spend some funds on the media to cover their work.

"Authorities of any level, municipal, regional and national, must have their work covered by the media," the Russian president said.

"It is necessary to allocate funds for this purpose because it is impossible to do anything without financial support. But these funds should be limited and information should be precise and state specific facts and nothing more than that," Putin said.