"Novaya Gazeta has suffered many losses," Kremlin spokeswoman Natalya Timakova said Tuesday. "[With the interview] the president wanted to express his moral support to it. ... The decision was the president's initiative."
Timakova said the interview, to be published Wednesday, touched upon civil society, the fight against corruption and reform of the judiciary.
Medvedev promised the interview after meeting the newspaper's editor in January and expressing condolences over the murder of reporter Anastasia Baburova earlier that month. Novaya Gazeta reporter Anna Politkovskaya was shot dead in 2006. The newspaper admonished former President Vladimir Putin for crushing freedoms, and he never give it an interview.
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