MOSCOW, May 5 - RAPSI. The court of appeals has upheld the decision on the claim filed by lifenews.ru founder and some print media outlets against Russia Today TV channel for the recovery of five million rubles for showing a video clip featuring Anna Chapman known for her involvement in last year’s “spy scandal.”

In December, the Moscow Commercial Court dismissed outright a lawsuit by News Media Rus, which alleged that the defendant had violated its rights to the audio/video work by running a 56-second video clip entitled “Complete video of Anna Chapman’s photo session for Zhara (Heat) magazine” taken from the plaintiff’s website. The full video playing time was 1 min 43 sec.

The court indicated in the ruling that the Civil Code allows quoting from works without the titleholder’s consent and payment but with credits and source. The court ruled that these conditions to had been observed.

The court of primary jurisdiction also stated that the plaintiff failed to prove that the video recording of Champan’s photo session was subject to copyright. In the defendant’s view it had been recorded by hidden camera.

The court of appeals agreed with the News Media Rus argumentation in favor of the video being subject to copyright, but did not reverse the earlier ruling.

News Media Rus comprises Lifenews.ru portal, Tvoy Den (Your Day) and Zhizn za Vsyu Nedelyu (Week’s Life) newspapers, and Zhara (Heat) magazine.

Anna Chapman was one of the ten people, mostly Russian citizens, who were arrested in the United States on suspicion of spying for Russia in June 2010. The U.S. District Court for New York’s Southern District charged them with conspiracy to act as foreign government agents without notifying the U.S. government.