The website of BBC Russian - bbcrussian.com - and GZT.RU, one of Russia's top ten online news portals, today announce a new agreement that will enable international news seekers to access a variety of Russian-language video content from bbcrussian.com, direct from the GZT.RU website.

The deal with the online news portal will make BBC video and text content available to a new audience of 1.6 million users per week.

Visitors to GZT.RU now have access to bbcrussian.com video and text content, updated 24 hours a day, seven days a week, across genres including news, current affairs, sports, the arts, business, entertainment and technology. All videos will carry bbcrussian.com branding.

Sarah Gibson, Head of BBC Russian, says: "Our ambition is to build on BBC Russian's well-established direct online audience through partnerships with highly-regarded online sites. Our global perspective makes us a unique resource for news consumers in Russia, and this is another way for them to access BBC news and analysis. We see Russian audiences turn to us on big stories, including Russian and regional ones, and we are really pleased to have another way through this partnership to make our content more accessible."

Sarah Jones, Head of Business Development, Europe, at BBC World Service, says: "The partnership with GZT.RU is an exciting one. It means that regular visitors to the site have instant, easy access to bbcrussian.com video content and text stories. We are committed in extending the reach of our content and delivering to audiences the best of the BBC's international news, with real depth and breadth."

Pavel Sukhov, Editor-in-Chief of GZT.RU, says: "The editorial team of GZT.RU highly values the results of the joint project for the placement of video clips and text produced by BBC Russian. GZT.RU endeavours to provide its visitors with a multi-dimensional daily news picture, and an important element of this is the professional video from BBC. Each month tens of thousands of views of the video on our portal demonstrate the huge interest amongst the audience for this offer. We hope to widen the area of our cooperation with the BBC in the future."