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The national broadcaster’s sales management division agreed and the spots were pulled.

“Traditionally we do not run advertising for assets that we compete with,” Alan Dark, general manager of CBC revenue group in charge of media sales and marketing, said in an interview Wednesday.

CBC accepts advertising for newspaper and magazine ads because it does not operate those types of media, it said and it informed Postmedia the campaign could continue if the ads were changed to focus on the chain’s print newspaper products rather than its digital products.

Mr. Dark said the CBC has run ads for newspapers in the past, “But we don’t run advertising to promote assets that we compete with directly and we have local sites in those markets that compete directly with [the local Postmedia sites].”

Postmedia owns the Windsor Star, the Regina Leader-Post and the Edmonton Journal.

“That strategy isn’t different for us than any other media supplier,” Mr. Dark said.

Siobhan Vinish, senior vice-president of marketing and audience development at Postmedia, said Wednesday the company was surprised by the decision to pull the ads. The spots are still running on CTV and Citytv stations in other markets, she said. Those stations are owned by BCE Inc. and Rogers Communications Inc., respectively and have news websites which come with Postmedia properties.

CBC receives more than $1-billion annually in government subsidies to support its activities, which include radio, conventional and satellite television, and Internet services with programming in English and French and eight Aboriginal languages.