According to the head of the Duma information committee, the new law “applies to all citizens, not just Russians”. There is hardly any significant power in the media operating abroad, but their supporters may be in danger in Russia.
In Russia may in the future be sentenced to up to 15 years in prison if publishing “false information” about the Russian army.
On Friday, the lower house of the Russian parliament, the Duma, approved an amendment to the Penal Code, which lists several varying degrees of punishment for spreading “lies”.
Speaker of the Duma Vyacheslav Volodin according to the bill will be sent directly to the president after approval by the federal council Vladimir Putin to sign. Therefore, the law would come into force on Saturday, Volodin says in the Duma press release.
Volodin argues that if Russia had not launched its “military peacekeeping operation,” Ukraine would soon have started a “war started by NATO”.
Russian censorship authority Roskomnadzor is demanding the media write about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine as a “special military operation”. The media must also not use non-official sources for their news.
Of St. Petersburg Fontanka magazine deliberate dissemination of “false information” about the military could result in three years in prison or fines ranging from 700,000 rubles to 1.5 million rubles.
An authority or “organized group” can be fined 3 to 5 million rubles or 5 to 10 years in prison for spreading lies.
Penalties of 10 to 15 years are available for “serious offenses”, which are not, however, further defined.
Sanctions and calls for the military to refrain from “defending Russia’s interests” can also result in varying amounts of fines and imprisonment.
Laissa it is probably above all about intimidating the Russian media and ordinary citizens so that they do not share anti-war messages.
Duma Director of the Information Committee Alexander Hinstein however, said the news agency Ria Novostin that the law “applies to all citizens, not just Russians, because we are talking about action against Russia”.
According to him, people with foreign citizenship who disseminate information from other countries are outside Russian law. However, Hinstein said these people often have “accomplices” who support their activities in Russia.
Russia may, of course, limit the visibility of Western media in their country. That is what it has done.
On Friday, Roskomnadzor restricted access to the BBC’s website, among other things. According to Roskomnadzor, the Russian-language pages of the independent Meduza online media, the German Deutsche Welle and Radio Liberty, were also restricted in Russia.
On Friday, the BBC announced that its journalists would leave Russia due to a new law. The BBC said it did not want to put its journalists and aides in Russia at risk, but that Ukraine’s conflict coverage continued.
Russia’s leading liberal media, Eho Moskvy, has shut down its news site and all its social media channels. Access to the site has been restricted in Russia for a week after it published “intentionally false information” about the war in Ukraine.
The independent online publication Znak also announced on Friday that it would suspend operations due to restrictions. The independent and critical Novaya Gazeta, on the other hand, announced the removal of its news content on the war in Ukraine.
In addition, police conducted searches on Friday at the office of Memorial, Russia’s leading human rights organization. Organization was ordered to be abolished last year.
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