Russian state-owned news agency RIA Novosti and publishing house Vremya have announced a re-branding strategy for daily newspaper Vremya Novostei, which involves the title being renamed "Moskovskie Novosti" by the beginning of 2011, Russkaya Gazeta informed today.

"We are convinced that the base newspaper Vremya Novostei and RIA Novosti will create the most modern newspaper, that will use all sorts of formats and platforms to produce and deliver content to readers," said RIA Novosti's director Svetlana Mironyuk. "The combination of information-gathering possibilities that the agency has and the distribution channels that 'Moskovskie Novosti' will have will provide a huge synergy for all the members of the project."

Moskovskie Novostie" was launched in 1930 as an English-language daily (called The Moscow News) oriented towards foreigners residing on Russian territory. In around 20 years, the paper began publishing in Russian. During the Gorbachev era, the paper was considered as the "authoritative" and "powerful" daily, Russkaya Gazeta mentioned. Svoboda News added that it used to be the leading democratic title.

Following the fall of the Soviet Union, "Moskovskie Novosti" saw plunging readership. It saw

numerous editorial changes and by the end of 2007, a decision was made by its then owner Arkadii Gaidamak to cease publishing because of "commercial" reasons as the socio-political press was deemed unprofitable, NEWSru.com wrote. However, publishing continued for a while the following year.

The Moscow News and its Russian-language counterpart were consequently sold to RIA Novosti, which only continued to publish the English edition and established an Arabic-language one.

Market experts contemplated that the daily's reincarnation was not a commercial venture, but rather a political one, in light of the upcoming elections. Russkaya Gazeta suggested that the paper may have difficulties as it has to embark on an audience-attracting strategy from square one.

According to RIA Novosti, the news agency offers news regarding society, politics, economics, science and sports across Internet and mobile platforms in 14 languages. The outlet has correspondents in 45 Russian cities and 40 countries worldwide.