Novaya Gazeta vacates Moscow offices, citing pressure from Russian authorities

Novaya Gazeta, long seen as Russia's foremost independent newspaper, left its Moscow offices on Monday under an eviction order, blaming persistent pressure from officials and the security services, according to the Associated Press report carried by PBS NewsHour.

The AP called it the last major outlet inside Russia that still openly criticized the Kremlin. Other independent newsrooms shut down or relocated outside the country once the Russian military entered Ukraine in February 2022, the AP noted.

In an Oct. 30 statement cited by the AP, the paper said Russian authorities and security agencies had compelled its editors to halt their work.

The BBC reported that the team held one final editorial meeting Monday, then gathered their possessions and left. The AP described journalists removing pictures of murdered colleagues from the newsroom, and a new plaque placed over the old nameplate saying the paper had once lived there.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov described Russian media as very diverse and called the shutdown part of "a standard rotational process," according to the BBC.

The paper was established in 1993 and became known for probing graft, rights violations and abuses of power. According to the AP, six of its reporters have been killed, including Anna Politkovskaya, who documented the second war in Chechnya and was gunned down at her apartment building in 2006.

The AP outlined the steps officials took against the newspaper. It received a fine over accusations that it discredited the Russian military, and it was branded a "foreign agent," a label that is viewed negatively in Russia and may invite extra official attention. Its websites and apps were blocked, its printing operation was seized, its registration as a media outlet was cancelled, and its reader donation system was closed.

Co-founder Dmitry Muratov, who led the paper for years and was a joint 2021 Nobel Peace Prize laureate alongside Maria Ressa of the Philippines, had red paint thrown on him by an attacker aboard a train in 2022, the AP reported. He left the editor's post in 2023 after authorities gave him the foreign agent label as well.

Tatiana Britskaya, head of the investigations desk, told the AP she had braced for the shutdown nearly every day for four and a half years. "This is our home, and we're losing it," she said.

Sergei Sokolov, the current editor-in-chief, told the AP he believed the paper would eventually return stronger than before.

Several staff who departed Russia in 2022 launched a separate publication, Novaya Gazeta Europe, which the AP said has strongly criticized the Kremlin and its war in Ukraine.

Compiled by True News from reporting by PBS NewsHour and BBC News. Each outlet's original story is linked below.

Originally published by True News: https://truenews.bagleyenterprises.net/stories/924