Tigran Edmondovich Keosayan (Armenian: Տիգրան էդմոնդի Քեոսայան, Russian: Тигран Эдмондович Кеосаян; born January 4, 1966) is a Russian film director, actor and television presenter of Armenian origin. He is a winner of film festival prizes including TEFI, Kinotavr and Window to Europe Film Festival[ru] 2001.[1]
Described as a pro-Kremlin television presenter,[2] the European Union and United Kingdom imposed sanctions on Keosayan as a result of the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine.
On 24 June 2022, Kazakhstan reported that Keosayan was put in the same list with terrorists who are denied entry.[3]
Biography
Keosayan with Russian President Vladimir Putin and Tatyana Mitkova, October 2018
Keosayan is the son of Armenian-Russian film director and composer Edmond Keosayan and actress Laura Gevorkyan. He studied at the all-Union (now – all-Russian) state Institute of Cinematography (VGIK).
Keosayan is the director of Russian films including Katyka and Shiz (1992), Poor Sasha (1997), Lily of the Valley Silvery (2005), Hare Over the Abyss (2006), The Twelve Chairs musical (2003), a large number of clips for Mikhail Shufutinsky, Igor Sarukhanov, Irina Allegrova. He is co-operated with Fyodor Bondarchuk, Alexander Zbruev and others.
Keosayan is an anchorman of the daily (from Monday to Thursday) analytical talk show With Tigran Keosayan on the Russian private TV channel REN-TV.[4]
Personal life
Keosayan is married to Margarita Simonyan.
On 27 April 2022, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Kazakhstan announced its intention to introduce an absolute travel ban on entry into the country after his statements about the position of the Kazakh government in regards to the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine.[5][6] In a video posted on his YouTube channel, regarding news that Kazakhstan would not hold a Victory Day parade on 9 May, Keosayan asked "Kazakhs, brothers. What is with the non-gratitude?" and said "Look at Ukraine carefully, think seriously".[2]
On 24 June 2022, Kazakhstan reported that Keosayan was put in the same list with terrorists who are denied entry.[3]
Sanctions
After the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Keosayan was one of the individuals sanctioned by the European Union.[7][8] The reasons given for the sanctions were that Keosayan has spread anti-Ukrainian propaganda, and used his state-funded TV show to claim that the Ukrainian government was not lawful and repeatedly state that Crimea is part of Russia and that Donbass is not part of Ukraine. He has publicly accused Ukraine of escalating the conflict.[9]
He has consistently used his show to portray Ukraine as a weak and corrupt country that is being kept alive solely thanks to Western aid. Keosayan took part in the "Russian Donbass Basin" forum organized by the authorities of the so-called Donetsk People's Republic in Donetsk with the aim of spreading the "Russian Donbass Basin" doctrine.[10]
Keosayan was included in the list of Russians under personal sanctions by the United Kingdom in March.[11]
Controversy
Blackface segment about Barack Obama
On 30 November 2020, Keosayan's TV show "International Sawmill", for which Keosayan and his wife Margarita Simonyan are co-writers, aired a segment featuring Keosayan, and an actress in blackface posing as former United States President Barack Obama. In the segment, Keosayan, referring to Obama's book A Promised Land, asks the actress: "Do you consider this book your achievement?", to which the actress in blackface replies: "Of course."[12]
Keosayan then asks: "Because none of your relatives have written books?", after which the actress answers: "Because none of my relatives that came before me could write." Keosayan then states "you should have a rap musician, not the president". In the segment, the actress wears a bandana and gold chains and behaves in a way regarded as stereotypical to rappers.[13] The segment was widely deemed as being racist.[14][15]
DURCHFÜHRUNGSVERORDNUNG (EU) 2022/336 DES RATES vom 28. Februar 2022 zur Durchführung der Verordnung (EU) Nr. 269/2014 über restriktive Maßnahmen angesichts von Handlungen, die die territoriale Unversehrtheit, Souveränität und Unabhängigkeit der Ukraine untergraben oder bedrohen, PDF, (German)
DURCHFÜHRUNGSVERORDNUNG (EU) 2022/336 DES RATES vom 28. Februar 2022 zur Durchführung der Verordnung (EU) Nr. 269/2014 über restriktive Maßnahmen angesichts von Handlungen, die die territoriale Unversehrtheit, Souveränität und Unabhängigkeit der Ukraine untergraben oder bedrohen, PDF, (German)
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