You're reading: PRESS: Kyiv Post owner ready to sell newspaper

The owner of the Kyiv Post, a Ukrainian English-language newspaper, Mohammad Zahoor, wants to sell the newspaper for $2.4 million as it is not profitable, the Kommersant Ukraine wrote on Thursday.

"I am a businessman, not a politician. This business [the Kyiv Post] brings me no political dividends, but only a monthly loss of $80,000. We are still subsidizing the Kyiv Post, but it cannot last forever," Zahoor told the newspaper.

According to him, he is ready to sell the newspaper for $2.4 million, the businessmen derived this figure basing on the price he paid for the Kyiv Post in 2009, and the funds he has invested into its development since.

"I have offered the editor’s office to submit me a business plan on the further development of the newspaper before September 1 or to buy out the publication. If the newspaper becomes profitable by that time, we will not return to the issue of its sale, but if not we will look for a buyer," Zahoor added.

As reported, the Kyiv Post’s staff declared a strike demanding the reinstatement of their chief editor Brian Bonner, who was fired by the owner of the publication. The newspaper’s team said that Zahoor’s decision to fire chief editor Brian Bonner was due to his refusal to withdraw an interview with Agriculture Minister Mykola Prysiazhniuk.

According to Kommersant Ukraine, on April 20, Zakhur reinstated Bonner. Zahoor promised to set up an editorial board and make Bonner one of its members.

Deputy Chief Editor of the Kyiv Post Kateryna Horchynska said the talks between the newspaper’s editorial team and its owner resulted in "a partial compromise."

"On the one hand, Bonner has been reinstated, but he has not retained the post of chief editor. All decisions will now be taken by an editorial board, which, in addition to Bonner, includes the deputy chief editors – Roman Olearchyk and me, as well as business column editor James Marson," Horchynska told Kommersant Ukraine.

The Kyiv Post is the first English-language newspaper in Ukraine, founded by U.S. citizen Jed Sunden in Kyiv in 1995. Since 2009, the newspaper has been owned by Mohammad Zahoor, a British citizen and the owner of the ISTIL Group.