Notebook

Media Bargain

Oligarch snaps up ailing British paper

Billionaire, Duma deputy, and former KGB Colonel Alexander Lebedev, 49, has his sights set on building a media empire by snapping up struggling European papers, The Times of London wrote. In January, Lebedev reportedly ac-quir-ed a controlling share in London’s Evening Standard for £1. According to The Guardian, the Evening Standard has been losing up to €10 million per year.