During the Soviet era,
Komsomolskaya Pravda was an all-union newspaper of the
Soviet Union and an official organ of the
Central Committee of the
Komsomol. Established in accordance with a decision of the
13th Congress of the Russian Communist Party (b), it first appeared on 24 May 1925 in an edition of 31,000 copies.
Komsomolskaya Pravda began as the official organ of the Komsomol, the
youth wing of the
Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU). As such, it targeted the same 14 to 28 demographics as its parent organization, focusing initially on popular science and adventure articles while teaching the values of the CPSU. During this period, it was twice awarded the
Order of Red Banner of Labour (in 1950 and 1957) and was also the recipient of the
Order of Lenin (in 1930), of the
Order of the October Revolution (in 1975), and of the
Order of the Patriotic War (in 1945). The paper's largest owner is the son of the founder of the Baltic Media Group, Sergei Rudnov, who indirectly controls 45%. Until 2011, it was owned by Media Partner, which in turn was owned by ESN Group (), an energy company led by
Grigory Berezkin. In December 2000 the Norwegian media company
A-Pressen bought 25 percent plus one share of the paper. It is published in tabloid format by "Izdatelsky Dom Komsomolskaya Pravda" (Komsomolskaya Pravda Publishing House). According to the
European Commission,
Komsomolskaya Pravda has also been described as Russian president
Vladimir Putin's favourite newspaper. In 2001, it was the ninth-top European newspaper with a circulation of 785,000 copies. It was the top-selling newspaper in Russia in 2006 with daily circulation ranging from 700,000 to 3.1 million copies. Its March 2008 circulation, certified by the NCS, was 660,000 copies In the same year the online version of the paper was also the most visited news website. In May 2017, columnist Alisa Titko went viral for writing that the English city of
Manchester was "full of fat people" and that she found the sight of same-sex love "disgusting". In 2021, the tabloid published an article in which former
Kontinental Hockey League coach
Andrei Nazarov accused
New York Rangers winger
Artemi Panarin of sexually assaulting an 18-year-old Latvian woman in
Riga. The team released a statement condemning the allegations as a "fabrication" and "intimidation tactic" against Panarin after speaking out against "recent political events", most notably expressing his support for
Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who was detained upon return to Russia from Germany. In September 2022,
Komsomolskaya Pravda editor in chief Vladimir Sungorkin died. The official cause of death was a stroke, but came amid
a series of suspicious deaths of Russian businesspeople, Russian oligarchs, and journalists since 2022. In December 2023,
Komsomolskaya Pravda deputy editor in chief was also found dead in her apartment. In February 2023, news editor Vladimir Romanenko published anti-war articles documenting
Russian war crimes and criticising the alleged torture of
Alexei Navalny. These articles were deleted within 10 minutes, and Romanenko no longer works for the publication. ==Editors in chief ==