"100% of shares in the Kommersant publishing house earlier divided between several foreign companies have been consolidated on the balance of the Russian company Kommersant Holding set up by Alisher Usmanov," the news release said.
Andrei Galiyev, a former reporter for leading business daily Kommersant and the Kommersant Weekly and Expert magazines, will be director general of the new holding. He will also sit on the board of directors at the Kommersant publishing house, chaired by Usmanov.
Uzbek-born Usmanov, who also heads a subsidiary of state-controlled energy giant Gazprom [RTS: GAZP], bought the Kommersant publishing house, whose eponymous flagship daily had been known for opposition to the government, almost a year ago.
