Novaia Gazeta ceases operations after 30 years / Pressure from the Russian authorities forced the closure of the independent publication

Russian independent publication Novaya Gazeta is ceasing operations after approximately 30 years, editor-in-chief Sergei Sokolov announced on Friday. The decision was made amid pressure from the Russian authorities, who restricted the newsroom’s activities and blocked its sources of funding.

“Novaya Gazeta is ceasing to exist,” Sokolov said in a video message posted on YouTube. The newsroom announced that on November 9 it would turn off the lights at its office in central Moscow, where journalists had worked for three decades, shut down the servers and leave.

According to the publication Meduza, the newsroom was evacuated on Thursday. After the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the authorities blocked Novaya Gazeta’s websites, revoked its license and recently designated it a “foreign agent.” The donation platform was also blocked, affecting the newspaper’s operations.

The publication’s activities had already been curtailed after military censorship was introduced in Russia in February 2022. Novaya Gazeta denounced the pressure on journalists and noted that six of its colleagues had been assassinated during the current regime. The newsroom says it has entered a “death zone” where it can no longer report freely on the war and Russian society.