News Corp may sell Weekly Standard: paper

(Reuters) - Media conglomerate News Corp is near a deal to sell its political magazine, Weekly Standard, to Denver billionaire Philip Anschutz, the Los Angeles Times said, citing people familiar with the situation.

Weekly Standard has been a pet political project of News Corp Chairman Rupert Murdoch, but now that he owns the Wall Street Journal that reaches a bigger number of people, Murdoch may not really need the Weekly Standard, the paper said.

The paper gave no value for the deal.

A News Corp representative declined to comment to the paper, while a representative for Anschutz could not be reached by it.

Reuters could not immediately reach a Weekly Standard spokeswoman for comments outside regular hours.

(Reporting by Esha Dey in Bangalore; Editing by David Cowell)