Predvestnik

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Predvestnik

Type	Free monthly newspaper
Format	Broadsheet

Owner	Pari Hoxha
Founded	2004
Language	Russian
Price	Free
Headquarters	Westfield, Massachusetts USA
Circulation	4000

Website: predvestnik.com

Predvestnik (Forerunner) is a Russian language newspaper published in the Pioneer Valley, Massachusetts. It was founded in 2004.

Predvestnik covers a wide variety of local and world news, as well publishing articles on Christian subjects. It appears monthly with a circulation of around 4,000 and is printed in a full color broadsheet format. The newspaper is delivered free to the public.

[edit] Target readership

The newspaper serves immigrants from the former Soviet Union republics that emigrated to Western Massachusetts since 1989. The majority of these immigrants belong to the Evangelical Christian faith (Pentecostal and Baptist).^{[citation needed]} They were allowed to obtain refugee status by the United States Department of State because of religious persecution. Russian Jewish immigrants who moved to Western Massachusetts during the same period represent a significantly smaller number.^{[citation needed]} Other faiths in the area include Armenian, Orthodox and even a small percentage of Muslim Turkish minorities that started arriving from Russia in 2006.

For more than 15 years the Russian speaking community has drastically grown in numbers, and in cities like Westfield, Massachusetts, they constitute around 10% of the population. Thousands more are located in West Springfield, Springfield, Chicopee, Agawam and other towns. Information from local municipalities and immigrant agencies suggests that the population is more than 25,000 in the Pioneer Valley.^{[citation needed]}

Most immigrants from the former Soviet Union speak Russian at home. They also favor news media in their own language. As such, the newspaper is the only source for local news, information and inspiration in their language.