Religious groups want Russian cartoon channel shut down

For a second time in two weeks, religious groups have called for the closure of Russia's cartoon channel 2X2.

Christian and Muslim groups are demanding that 2X2 be shut down because it airs cartoons, such as South Park, which they deem to be anti-religious, violent as well as promoting homosexuality.

'We live in a fully secular, not puritan state.' Yekaterina Doglosheveva, spokesperson for 2X2

The Consultative Council of the Heads of the Protestant Churches in Russiais urging the country's top prosecutor Yury Chaika to intervene.

"Through the use of cartoons this channel is pumping, day and night, an ideology into the consciousness of minors of perversion and other vices," said the council in a statement released this week.

Umar-Khazrat Idrisov, the head of a regional Muslim association, has called on the country's Federal Culture and Cinematography Agency to strip 2X2 of its licence. "Destructive energy" should not be aired on TV said Idrisov.

"The Federal Culture and Cinematography Agency may be able to control the activities of our channel, but the Protestants cannot," said Yekaterina Doglosheveva, head of corporate affairs for Prof-Media the company that owns 2X2.

The channel, which has about a 2 per cent audience share, has said its target audienceis men aged 16 to 30, not children.

"We live in a fully secular, not puritan state," Doglosheveva told the Russian news agency Interfax.

"The atheists could have just as well written a letter to demand that all religious channels and programs be closed. We work respecting the constitution, we do not violate the law."

Earlier this month, 2X2 pulled American cartoons Happy Tree Friends and The Adventures of Big Jeff from its schedules after an official complaint from government watchdog, Rossvyazokhrankulutra, that the cartoons were too cruel and violent.

The MTV channel in Russia also shows South Park, but has not been targeted by the Protestant group.