600 Seconds

{{Short description|Soviet/Russian TV program (1987–93)}} {{italic title}} {{Expand Russian|topic=cult|600 секунд|date=March 2014}}

'''''600 Seconds''''' ({{langx|ru|600 секунд}}; 1987 to 1993) was a popular TV news program that aired in the Soviet Union and briefly in post-Soviet Russia. It was a nightly broadcast from Leningrad TV (later Channel 5) with anchor Alexander Nevzorov.<ref name=nyt090789>[https://www.nytimes.com/1989/09/07/arts/hip-hot-and-hyper-soviet-tv-cuts-loose.html?pagewanted=all " Hip, Hot and Hyper: Soviet TV Cuts Loose"], ''The New York Times'', September 7, 1989</ref>

The program of the {{tlit|ru|glasnost}} period was distinguished by its fast tempo and the display of the countdown from 600 to zero.<ref name=nyt090789/> The anchor Nevzorov used the broadcast in order to criticize corrupt Soviet officials and promote preserving the Soviet Union (in the Baltic States, he is known as a fierce opponent of the national independence movements). Later during the early Boris Yeltsin years, the broadcast became a mouthpiece of Russian nationalist opposition to Yeltsin's policies and was banned twice – definitively after Yeltsin's victory in his conflict with the rebel parliament. The Letter of Forty-Two called for the program to be cancelled.<ref name=letter>{{cite news|script-title=ru:Писатели требуют от правительства решительных действий |url=http://vivovoco.rsl.ru/VV/PAPERS/HONOUR/LETT42.HTM |access-date=21 August 2011 |newspaper=Izvestia |date=5 October 1993 |language=ru |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110716043414/http://vivovoco.rsl.ru/VV/PAPERS/HONOUR/LETT42.HTM |archive-date=16 July 2011 }}</ref>

==References== {{Reflist}}

Category:1980s Soviet television series Category:1990s Russian television series Category:Russian television news shows