The Russian President has Ordered the Closure of Novaya Gazeta after 33 years. It had previously been Placed on a List of State Enemies. The Newspaper, which is known for its Critical Coverage of Russian Political and Social Affairs, has been Classed as a “Foreign Agent” by Moscow.
Sergei Sokolov, the Paper’s Editor-in-Chief, said in a Video Statement on YouTube: “Novaya Gazeta is ceasing to exist. The Russian authorities, the Russian special services, have forced the editorial team to end its work.” The Paper was previously placed under Investigation, with One of its Journalists Detained and the Home of a Senior Editor Searched.
Mr Sokolov added: “Novaya Gazeta has been killed... On Nov 9 we will turn off the lights in our home, where we have lived for 30 years. We will shut down the servers and leave. “They’re simply throwing us out, giving us barely any time to pack up. The Anna Politkovskaya museum is closing, and portraits of our friends who were killed are being taken down from the walls.”
Mr Sokolov was taken in for questioning earlier this month when his home was searched. Novaya Gazeta was founded in 1993. It stopped publishing its print edition in 2022, after Russia invaded Ukraine. A European edition of the paper – Novaya Gazeta Europe – was launched from Latvia to avoid censorship, but the website was later blocked by Russia.
Shortly after the invasion, Russia’s Basmanny Court also revoked Novaya Gazeta’s media licence. Novaya Gazeta’s office, located on Potapovsky Lane, also housed a museum in tribute to Anna Politkovskaya, one of the newspaper’s reporters, who was killed 20 years ago this month when she was shot in front of her apartment in Moscow. Dmitry Muratov, the newspaper’s former editor and a Nobel Peace Prize laureate, was travelling to Paris on Oct 19 for a commemoration of her death when he discovered the publication was being evicted.
He and Mr Sokolov gathered the paper’s remaining staff on Oct 26 in the basement of the building next door because it was too dangerous to talk in the office, owing to a break-in the previous night. Staff agreed that it was time to shut down the publication. “We haven’t died, they’ve killed us – along with the constitution,” Mr Muratov told The Economist. “You can only laugh at Article 29 of the constitution: ‘Censorship is prohibited’.”
He said Novaya Gazeta “was our city”, adding: “They’ve destroyed this city and we’re leaving. But we are not leaving our work.” A change to the Russian criminal code was passed in March 2022, eight days after the invasion of Ukraine, which criminalised the dissemination of “false information” about the Russian military.
Since the law was passed, at least 30 independent Russian media outlets have been forced. Oleg Roldugin, a Novaya Gazeta journalist, was arrested in April and charged with “unlawful access to computerised information”. He pleaded not guilty, according to the state RIA news agency.
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