Over the past week, Russian authorities have launched an unprecedented crackdown on what remains of the country’s independent media and those challenging the Kremlin’s narrative about the invasion of Ukraine.
In a single day, two of the last major independent broadcasters – Ekho Moskvy and Dozhd TV – fell silent after having their websites blocked by the state media regulator, which has gone into censorship overdrive in a desperate effort to manage the narrative.
Even the storied Novaya Gazeta – edited by Nobel Peace Prize winner Dmitry Muratov – has said it is removing content about the conflict in Ukraine due to concerns over fears for the criminal prosecution of its journalists.
Many leading foreign media – including the BBC, CNN, Bloomberg News, ABC, CBS News and Canada’s CBC/Radio-Canada – have decided to temporarily suspend broadcasting or news gathering in Russia since the amendment, which applies to foreign as well as Russian citizens, was signed into law by Vladimir Putin.
The International Press Institute (IPI), a global network of editors, media executives and leading journalists said that it came as the State Duma passed a law criminalizing “false information” about the country’s armed forces, which could see journalists reporting about alleged war crimes or Russian military losses jailed for up to 15 years.
Meanwhile, it pointed out that a dozen other news websites have been blocked and threatened with administrative fines; use of the terms “war” and “invasion” have been banned by the regulator; journalists reporting on anti-war protests across the country have faced arbitrary arrests and many have fled the country fearing risks to their safety or hefty jail sentences.
Amidst this rapidly escalating crackdown, IPI ask whether independent journalism as we know it in Russia will survive and how leading journalists are navigating this dangerous news landscape?
Russia has enacted two laws, adopted and brought into force on March 4, that criminalize independent war reporting and protesting the war, with penalties of up to 15 years in prison.
The global human rights organization Human Rights Watch (HRW) said he laws make it illegal to spread “fake news” about the Russian armed forces, to call for an end to their deployment and to support sanctions against Russian targets.
“These new laws are part of Russia’s ruthless effort to suppress all dissent and make sure the population does not have access to any information that contradicts the Kremlin’s narrative about the invasion of Ukraine,” said Hugh Williamson, Europe and Central Asia director at HRW.
The two laws were fast-tracked through parliament on March 4, with both chambers adopting them unanimously. President Putin signed them and brought them into effect the same day.
Demanding to immediately repeal the draconian law, the head of RSF’s Eastern Europe and Central Asia desk of Reporters Without Borders (RSF) eanne Cavelier said “With this new amendment, putting journalists in Russia at risk of significant criminal penalties, Vladimir Putin has delivered the final blow and completed the destruction of Russia’s independent media, which had already been considerably weakened by the foreign agents law enacted at the end of 2017”
The move plunges Russia into “an information dark age,” said Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) Executive Director Robert Mahoney. A local journalist told Mahoney, “The Russian media is dead.” According to CPJ, at least 150 Russian journalists are believed to have left the country in the face of Moscow’s crackdown on independent Russian media.
The laws impose strict censorship on all discussion of Russia’s war with Ukraine, with Russian authorities banning the description of it as “war” or “an invasion.” But the laws are not limited to the current war in Ukraine but apply to any deployment involving Russian armed forces, such as those under the regional military alliance, the Collective Security Treaty Organization.
There is also a threat that the law could be applied retroactively. Russian authorities have routinely charged people with extremism or involvement with “undesirable organizations” based on social media posts that date from years prior to those groups being banned.
For example, in September 2021, a court fined Igor Kalyapin, chairperson of the Russian Committee Against Torture, with “distributing materials” of an “undesirable” foreign organization.
The material in question was an article posted on The Committee against Torture’s website reporting that a Czech humanitarian group had honored Kalyapin for his human rights work. T
The Czech organization, People in Need, was subsequently blacklisted as “undesirable” in 2019, two years after Kalyapin’s organization posted the article. The law was applied nonetheless, with Russian law enforcement and the courts interpreting the posts as a “continuous violation”.
If the authorities apply the same approach to the new laws, Russian opposition politicians, activists, and journalists who have already publicly called to end the war, protested, publicized alleged violations by Russian armed forces, or called for sanctions on Russian targets, could be at risk of prosecution. Those outside Russia could also be subject to potential extradition attempts.
HRW called on all governments to refuse any future extradition request for Russian nationals for offenses under these laws, as it would lead to violations of the extradited person’s fundamental rights and violate the state’s international legal obligations.
