Moscow ? Faced with international criticism over the Yukos Oil crackdown, the war in Chechnya and a perceived rollback of democratic freedoms, the Russian government announced Tuesday it would launch a 24-hour satellite television station in English to offer an alternative glimpse of the world through Russian eyes.

Officials overseeing the $30 million-a-year project, dubbed “Russia’s BBC” by its backers, said the broadcast would remain outside direct government control but would present a Russian perspective on issues from the war in Iraq to the proposed European Constitution, not usually heard in the international mass media.

Backers hope to have the service, Russia Today, operating by year’s end. Financing for the first year’s budget will come from a combination of government and private lending sources that have yet to be determined.

Analysts said the broadcast service would almost certainly act as a Kremlin mouthpiece but its financial viability would be determined by its ability to also present alternative viewpoints and a realistic view of unfolding political events in Russia.

“It is obvious that the Kremlin is not satisfied with the current information being reported about Russia and wants to create a new image for the country,” said Manana Aslamazyan, director of Internews Russia, a nonprofit media-support organization.

“It is an effort to create an external image of the ‘managed democracy’ that we are building, and to show it in an attractive way,” she said. “But I hope that the Kremlin will have enough political foresight to understand it is necessary to show a real picture of Russia, if they want people to watch it.”

The television project is reportedly the brainchild of Mikhail Y. Lesin, a wealthy media businessman and media adviser to President Vladimir V. Putin. It is being shepherded by RIA Novosti, the official Russian information agency.

“Many foreigners are surprised to see that Russia is different from what they see in media reports. We will try to present a more balanced picture,” said Margarita Simonyan, a former Kremlin reporter for state television who has been appointed editor in chief of the new project.

“It’s going to be an information channel with competing points of view, so the audience can make up its mind about what is right and what is wrong,” she said.

RIA Novosti’s managing director, Svetlana V. Mironyuk, told reporters at the station’s official launch news conference that it would be virtually impossible in the competitive world of global television to operate a news operation strictly as a propaganda tool.

“It is almost impossible to impose your own point of view among other opinions because the information space is too huge. There are literally scores of alternatives,” Mironyuk said.