"We do not expect anyone to praise us, on the contrary, we will be grateful for objective criticism," Russia's Ambassador to Germany Vladimir Kotenev told the competition's organizers and journalists.
According to him, the results of last year's Golden Verb competition showed that "many foreign journalists not only understand Russia but love it."
But, in his opinion, comments made by foreign media about Russia "sometimes are reminiscent of the Cold War, and the authors seem to feel like sitting in its trenches."
President of the Russian Media Union Alexander Lyubimov said: "We started preparing the first competition, orienting ourselves mainly to reporters from CIS states but then it suddenly turned out that there was an interest in Germany, Spain, Great Britain, the United States, Canada, and other countries."
He said that the Russian Foreign Ministry and the Union of Foreign Correspondents Accredited in Russia gave support to the Media Union to hold this large-scale creative competition.
Mr. Lyubimov said that last year's winners included, pieces by German television reporters from Deutsche Welle and a series of critical reports on Lake Baikal's environment by a Spanish journalist.
"The Spanish journalist was simply stunned when he learnt that he would receive a cash prize that he could use to publish his book," he said.
In his opinion, the Golden Verb's prestige has rapidly grown in different parts of the world because the competition's jury has been composed how highly professional people. The jury includes, in particular, RIA Novosti Director General Svetlana Mironyuk, Lyudmila Verbitskaya, the rector of St. Petersburg State University, and Nikolai Zyatkov, the editor of Argumenty i Fakty.
The names of this year's winners will be announced in Moscow in September, and then the organizers plan to hold a ceremony in London.
