MOSCOW (Sputnik) — According to research by Medialogia monitoring and analysis company, commissioned by the Gazeta newspaper, Russian media outlets wrote 51,933 news stories citing Peskov in the period of January 1 to March 31. There have been 20,964 articles quoting Zakharova in the same time period.
Russian Defense Ministry’s Igor Konashenkov and Investigative Committee’s Vladimir Markin came third and fourth, with 10,543 and 10,119 articles, respectively.
Last year, during the same time period, there have been 37,753 stories conveying what Peskov said. Zakharova’s predecessor Alexander Lukashevich was quoted 5,456 times.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has been quoted almost half a million times in the first four months of 2016, with 431,665 news stories citing him. He is followed by Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev with 140,456 articles and Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov with 51,421 articles.