Critical Russian radio station “Echo of Moscow” closed after Putin regime blockade

The board of directors of Gazprom Media, owner of the radio station “Echo of Moscow”, one of the few media that offered spaces to voices critical of the Kremlin, ordered this Thursday the closure of the station and its website.

“It is the decision of the shareholder, the owner. We cannot comment otherwise.”, declared the Kremlin spokesman, Dmitri Peskov, about the liquidation of the radio, one of the few media, if not the only one, that served as a platform for representatives of the entire Russian political spectrum.

Last Tuesday, the Russian communications regulator Roscomnadzor blocked the broadcasts and web pages of the “Echo of Moscow” radio and the “Dozhd” television channel.

Roscomnadzor’s decision was prompted by the Russian Prosecutor General’s Office, which accused the media of deliberately and systematically publishing “calls for extremist actions, violence, and false information about the actions of the Russian military in the special operation” in Ukraine.

“I am dismayed, although everything that is happening was expected. I assumed that ‘Echo of Moscow’ would be closed one way or another in that situation”, the founder and first director of the station, Sergei Korzun, wrote on Telegram.

Founded in August 1990, at the time of the “perestroika“Mikhail Gorbachev,”echo of moscow”, Korzún noted, was created as an alternative to Gostelerradio, the Soviet radio and television monopoly.

“Everything has returned to its place (to the monopoly of information) and it is difficult, when you are in free fall, to predict what awaits you”, added the founder of the station, whose slogans are “listen to the radio, the rest is appearance” and “a free radio for free people”.