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Russia Today TV channel to launch a talk show with Julian Assange

The programme guests will feature key political figures, activists and well-known social activists

MOSCOW, January 26 (Itar-Tass) — Russia Today, a Russian TV channel, has agreed with founder of a scandalous WikiLeaks site Julian Assange to broadcast from mid-March already his talk show in the English-language channel, broadcasting abroad. The programme guests will feature key political figures, activists and well-known social activists.

On Wednesday, chief editor of the channel, Margarita Simonyan wrote in her Twitter that Russia Today will start broadcasting Julian Assange’s “The World Today.” “He is the very new author I mentioned in December. I have not been that excited about any other show on our channel,” she said. Simonyan told the Kommersant that negotiations with representative of Assange had began in last 2011, and were over in early January during her trip to London. “Assange knows our channel well, as we have interviewed him several times. Julian Assange does not fit in the general paradigm of the world media space,” Margarita Simonyan said explaining why the founder of the WikiLeaks had chosen the Russia Today channel.

Commenting on his decision, Assange stressed that during the shows he would open a window towards tomorrow while talking to those who are forming it, the Komsomolskaya Pravda writes. “Are we heading towards utopia, or dystopia and how we can set our paths? This is an exciting opportunity to discuss the vision of my guests in a new style of show that examines their philosophies and struggles in a deeper and clearer way than has been done before,” he said. The hacktivist refers organisation of a television programme of the kind with unstable situation in the world.

The sphere of interests of Assange includes all up-to-date problems in the world – from the “Arab Spring” to discredit to Western political institutions, the Moskovsky Komsomolets writes. No, doubt that development of the Internet is of concern of the scandalous resource’ author.

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