Derk Sauer, founder of Vedomosti and The Moscow Times, dies

Derk Sauer, the Dutch media manager, who spearheaded independent media in Russia, has died at the age of 72. Sauer arrived in Russia in the dying days of the Soviet Union, and in the 1990s became renowned as one of the founding fathers of the post-Soviet media market. He created Independent Media, Russia’s biggest publishing house, and founded Vedomosti, the country’s most influential business newspaper. After selling Independent Media, he continued to play a vital role in the Russian media landscape. In the mid-2010s he transformed RBC into a major quality online publication, thoroughly irking the Kremlin. And after the invasion of Ukraine, he forged an independent media hub in the Netherlands, organizing for Dozhd TV to broadcast in exile from Amsterdam. He died as the result of spinal injuries sustained in a yachting accident at the start of July.