“The attack on media freedom”: the United States reacted to the restriction of access to the resources of “Echo of Moscow”

In Russia, there is an “offensive” on freedom of the media and the truth. This is the opinion of the US State Department, the text of the statement is published on the official website.

The document notes that the State Department recorded in the Russian Federation “efforts to mislead and conceal the truth.” In particular, we are talking about restricting access to the Ekho Moskvy radio station.

Recall that on March 1, the Prosecutor General’s Office demanded to restrict access to Ekho Moskvy, explaining this by calls for extremist activity. The radio station was taken off the air, its website was blocked. The editors said they would challenge the decision in court. The Dozhd TV channel, recognized as a foreign agent in the Russian Federation, also warned about the restrictions.

On the eve of Roskomnadzor recalled that the dissemination of deliberately false information in the media entails liability under Article 13.15 of the Code of Administrative Offenses, in the form of an administrative fine of up to five million rubles.

On February 24, Russian President Vladimir Putin made an emergency appeal to the Russians and announced a special military operation in the Donbass. In his speech, he stated that “circumstances require decisive action from Russia” and stressed that “Russia will not allow Ukraine to have nuclear weapons.” In response to Russia’s actions, Western countries (USA, Canada, European Union, Great Britain, Japan) announced new, tougher sanctions against the Russian Federation, including financial and economic ones.

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