Media

[TsarSamuil]

Russia labels German state broadcaster ‘foreign agent’

RT.com
28 Mar, 2022 16:23

Germany’s state-sponsored broadcaster Deutsche Welle is now considered a “foreign agent” under Russian law after the Ministry of Justice in Moscow included it on the register on Monday.

“Following the requirements of the current legislation of the Russian Federation, the Russian Ministry of Justice included Deutsche Welle into the register of foreign media outlets acting as a foreign agent,” the ministry said in an official statement. It added that the decision had been made “on the basis of documents received from authorized state authorities.”

The branding of Deutsche Welle as a foreign agent will force the German media to put a corresponding disclaimer on all of its content. The decision also obliges the broadcaster to fully disclose information regarding its funding – and Russian authorities will now closely monitor DW’s activities in the country.

Director-General of Deutsche Welle Peter Limbourg commented on the decision on Monday, saying it was expected. Limbourg called it “another step to attack the freedom of the press and a new attempt to cut off the Russian population from free information.”

Russia to kick out German state media after Berlin bans RT DEREAD MORE: Russia to kick out German state media after Berlin bans RT DE

Last month, in retaliation for Berlin blocking Russia’s channel RT DE, the Kremlin imposed a ban on DW in Russia. The German channel was cut off from broadcasting on the territory of Europe’s largest country. All staff members at DW’s Russian office were stripped of their press credentials.

“Even though our website and most social media channels have been blocked by the Putin government in recent days, people in Russia can find a variety of ways to circumvent censorship,” Limbourg said.

[TsarSamuil]

She looks like a vapid dumb slut, west gathers the traitors amongst the narcissistic ilk..

German media giant employs Russian TV protestor.

RT.com
12 Apr, 2022 09:45

German media giant Axel Springer announced on Monday it had hired Marina Ovsyannikova, a former video editor for Russia’s Channel One. She gained celebrity in the West after staging a protest, during a live broadcast, against the Russian attack on Ukraine.

Ovsyannikova, 43, will be reporting as a freelance journalist for the TV channel Welt, which is owned by Axel Springer, the publishing house said. Her coverage will include Ukraine and Russia, according to the statement.

“At a crucial moment, Marina Ovsyannikova had the courage to confront Russian viewers with an unembellished view of reality. In doing so, she defended the most important journalistic ethics – despite the threat of state repression. I am excited to be working with her,” Ulf Poschardt, editor-in-chief of WELT Group, said.

She already made her first contribution, a column published on the channel’s website. Headlined “the Russians are afraid,” it is focused on her person, her reaction to the violence in Ukraine and harassment that she has allegedly received online from Russians and Ukrainians alike, because “nobody wants to believe that it was a citizen’s emotional protest” when she staged her live demonstration.

Ovsyannikova became a cause celebre in mid-March after storming into the camera view at her former place of employment with a sign that said in English and Russian:“No war. Stop the war. Don’t trust propaganda. They’re lying to you here. Russians against war.” She was praised for her act by Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky and by many public figures in the West.

She resigned her position at Channel One days later. A senior manager for the channel said he doubted the protest was an emotional outburst contrary to what Ovsyannikova said. Kirill Kleimenov claimed she had contacts with the British embassy before staging it and had timed it exactly after payday. He even said that Ovsyannikova’s actions smacked of treason.

After the on-air stunt, a court in Moscow fined the journalist $293 in a separate case involving a post she made on social media. The post was a pre-recorded message that was tied with her ‘main event’ in the studio, in which Ovsyannikova decried the Russian government as an “anti-human regime” and called for mass protest against it.

The court ruled that the protests Ovsyannikova was advocating would violate Russian law, and thus calling for them constituted a misdemeanor. The defense argued that the prosecution was unlawful and that the charge itself was based on a false premise.

Ovsyannikova is facing a separate fine of up to $610 for the newsroom protest, with court proceedings scheduled for Thursday. She stands accused of knowingly spreading misinformation about the Russian military operation in Ukraine.

Attempts to discredit the armed forces were criminalized in Russia in the wake of the attack on Ukraine. The government claimed it was necessary to counter foreign propaganda about the conflict, amid criticism from rights groups.

Moscow attacked the neighboring state in late February, following Ukraine’s failure to implement the terms of the Minsk agreements signed in 2014, and Russia’s eventual recognition of the Donbass republics of Donetsk and Lugansk. The German and French brokered Minsk Protocol was designed to give the breakaway regions special status within the Ukrainian state.

Russia has since demanded that Ukraine officially declare itself a neutral country that will never join the US-led NATO military bloc. Kiev insists the Russian offensive was completely unprovoked and has denied claims it was planning to retake the two republics by force.

[TsarSamuil]

Ukrops cooperating with Al-Qaida media

White Helmets group shares tips with Ukrainians – media.

RT.com
12 Apr, 2022 13:22

White Helmets, a controversial group hailed as heroes in the West but also criticized for being close to radical Islamist forces in Syria, are filming video guides, which are meant for Ukrainians, the British newspaper Times reported on Monday.

The first of a planned series of videos, which the Times said will be translated into Ukrainian, showed two men explaining how to search for people under debris, identify unexploded ordnance and use first aid on injured people.

There is an overarching goal of teaching people in Kiev that “properly documenting rescue operations can help to provide credible evidence of atrocities,” according to Times. The group advised filming the action with GoPro cameras for later use.

White Helmets was created in 2014 and claims to be a civilian rescue force helping civilians injured by the Syrian government. It received funding from Western governments and was praised by Western media as brave heroes of the protracted war in Syria.

Critics, including Russia, call them a propaganda outfit that work hand-in-glove with the rebel groups that control the territories, in which the White Helmets operate. On several occasions, members of the group were filmed participating in apparent executions by jihadists.

In some cases, Western media outlets confirmed the allegations to be true. For example, France 24 authenticated footage showing the White Helmets taking part in an execution in Haritan, a suburb of Aleppo, which was carried out in 2015 by the terrorist group Al Nusra Front. The group distanced itself from the incident, saying their goal was “to go pick up the body” and that its people arrived before the killing took place.

According to the Times, the first video guide for Ukrainians was filmed in Ariha, a city in the Idlib province. It’s the last major stronghold of anti-government forces in Syria, in which radical Islamists have a dominating position.

The Syrian province borders Turkey, a NATO member which threatened to use its armed forces in defense of the rebels, claiming that it was necessary to prevent a new surge of refugees fleeing to Turkish territory. Russia, which aided Damascus in its fight against jihadists, helped it establish an arrangement with Ankara that limits cross-border hostilities.

The Ukrainian government accused Russia of an attempted genocide of the Ukrainian people after claiming it found evidence of war crimes committed by Russian troops near Kiev. Some towns close to the Ukrainian capital were held by Russian forces, but switched hands after Moscow pulled back its troops in the wake of diplomatic progress made during Turkey-hosted peace talks in early April.

Moscow rejected Ukrainian allegations and claimed the evidence was misinterpreted or fabricated, likely to derail the peace process. Kiev said it expected to find more evidence of Russian war crimes. Moscow said that apparently more staged scenes falsely purporting to show Russian wrongdoing in Ukraine were being prepared by the Ukrainian side.

Many Western nations took Kiev’s allegations against Russia on face value without any neutral investigation on the ground.

[TsarSamuil]

Ukrainian plot to kill Russian journalist foiled – Moscow.

RT.com
25 Apr, 2022 11:09

Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) claimed on Monday that it had detained a group of “neo-Nazis” instructed by Kiev to kill prominent Russian TV host and journalist Vladimir Solovyov.

According to the FSB, the hit was ordered by the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU). “The members of the criminal group have confessed to preparing to kill Solovyov and flee abroad afterwards.”

The FSB said that during searches, it seized an explosive device, eight Molotov cocktails, six handguns, a sawed-off hunting rifle, and a grenade. It added that more than 1,000 rounds of ammunition were seized as well, along with fake Ukrainian passports.

The statement followed shortly after President Vladimir Putin said that “a terrorist group was planning to attack and kill a well-known Russian journalist.”

“They will deny it, obviously, but the facts and evidence are solid,” he added, speaking at a meeting of the Prosecutor General’s Office Board earlier in the day.

Solovyov, 58, hosts a popular political talk show on Russia 1 TV, the ‘Full Contact’ radio show, and actively comments on social media. The veteran journalist is known for his pro-government position and has strongly supported Russia’s military operation in Ukraine.

In February, the EU put the presenter – along with 374 other Russians – on a no-fly and asset-freeze list. In early March, YouTube blocked his two channels, claiming they violated the platforms’ community guidelines.

In a statement on social media, the SBU denied that it had ever planned to kill Solovyov and dismissed the allegations as “fantasies of the Russian secret services.”

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Ukraine-backed radicals considered assassinating RT editor-in-chief – Moscow.

RT.com
25 Apr, 2022 18:28

A neo-Nazi group that was allegedly instructed by Kiev to kill TV anchor Vladimir Solovyov had several other targets, including RT Editor-in-Chief Margarita Simonyan, according to video footage released by Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB).

Amid the ongoing Russian military offensive in Ukraine aimed at the “denazification” of the country, the FSB claimed that it had detained a group of neo-Nazis. According to the service, the group had been instructed by the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) to kill popular Russian TV host and journalist Vladimir Solovyov. The FSB later released a video of what they said was the detention, search, and questioning of the suspects.

One of the detainees said that the group had been discussing the potential assassinations of the director general of the Sputnik news agency, Dmitry Kiselyov, the editor-in-chief of Sputnik and RT, Margarita Simonyan, and her husband, the prominent film director and TV presenter Tigran Keosayan, as well as TV hosts Olga Skabeeva and Evgeny Popov.

“The murders of people who spread propaganda were discussed, that is, Solovyov, Kiselyov, Skabeeva and Popov, Keosayan, Simonyan,” he said.

Commenting on the news, Simonyan said: “All people are mortal, and to die for not being silent, but for having the luxury of speaking the truth and protecting your Motherland in a way you find right and possible is no scarier than slowly going out from an incurable disease or from inevitably getting old. My attitude towards it is philosophical and Christian.”

The detained suspect also revealed that the SBU had ordered the group to kill Vladimir Solovyov “as soon as possible,” and also discussed “setting cars with symbols of support for the special operation and army recruitment offices on fire.”

The FSB claimed that, during the searches, it seized an explosive device, eight Molotov cocktails, six handguns, a sawed-off hunting rifle, and a grenade. It added that more than 1,000 rounds of ammunition were seized as well, along with fake Ukrainian passports. In the video filmed at the suspects’ apartment, a portrait of Adolf Hitler can also be seen.

In an interview with the Rossiya TV channel, Director of the FSB Alexander Bortnikov revealed some additional details regarding the group. He claimed that it consisted of six Russian citizens from Moscow. All of them have been detained, he said.

According to Bortnikov, the group was related to the neo-Nazi organization ‘National Socialists/White Power.’ The main task of the suspects, Bortnikov claimed, was to “determine the location of the assassination attempt” and therefore, according to him, the members of the group had been following Solovyov around.

Kiev has denied any involvement in the alleged assassination plots, claiming the FSB’s operation was “staged.”

[TsarSamuil]

White Helmets instructors deployed to Ukraine, Moscow claims.

RT.com
25 Apr, 2022 21:02

Ukrainian authorities and their foreign handlers are planning false-flag attacks involving weapons of mass destruction, Russia’s deputy permanent representative to the UN, Dmitry Polyansky said on Monday. For that purpose, instructors of the notorious Syria-based White Helmets group have already been deployed to Ukraine, the official told reporters.

The diplomat effectively reiterated the allegations raised over the weekend by the head of the Russian Radiation, Chemical and Biological Protection Force, Lieutenant General Igor Kirillov, who said the supposed plans harbored by the Kiev regime include “three scenarios,” ranging from a false-flag attack on civilians, to “tactical” small-scale use of WMDs and open deployment of such weaponry on the battlefield.

To facilitate the allegedly looming false-flag attack, overseas “handlers” of the Kiev authorities have sent “instructors” of the notorious White Helmets group to Ukraine, Polyansky stated.

“There is a well-known model in which such provocations [involving chemical weapons] are used in other parts of the world. First, a so-called chemical incident is organized. Then pro-Western non-governmental organizations, especially the infamous White Helmets, stationed nearby, quickly arrive on the scene and collect, in violation of all the norms of the non-proliferation regime, questionable ‘evidence’, and then feed this story to the Western media. We all know this technology,” Polyansky said.

“I can say that the curators of the Kiev regime are not very creative, so they are readying more or less the same scenario for Ukraine. The White Helmets instructors are already in Ukraine.”

The White Helmets group, co-founded by late British mercenary and presumed ex-intelligence officer James Le Mesurier, rose to international notoriety amid the years-long conflict in Syria.

The group, advertising itself as ‘Syrian Civil Defense’, has operated exclusively in areas controlled by assorted jihadist groups opposing President Bashar Assad’s government. The White Helmets have been involved in multiple purported ‘chemical incidents’ blamed on government troops and used by Western nations to carry out strikes against the Syrian military and its allies.

Polyansky stressed that Moscow harbors no plans to use any kind of WMDs in Ukraine. While Russia does not even possess any chemical or biological weapons, using them would not make any military sense, the diplomat went on.

“What is the point of using them in Ukraine in an immediate vicinity of our border? We will get nothing that could not be achieved through conventional means,” he said.

[TsarSamuil]

Russian court freezes Google assets.

RT.com
26 Apr, 2022 14:51

Moscow’s Court of Arbitration has frozen the assets of Google’s Russian subsidiary to the tune of 500 million rubles ($6.6 million).

The judge ruled in favor of Russia’s ‘Entertainment Television’, which sued the tech giant after YouTube blocked one of its channels, according to the Interfax news agency.

The plaintiff demanded that Google restore full access to the TNT channel’s account or else pay a penalty.

Apart from Google’s Russian subsidiary, American Google LLC as well as Google Ireland Limited and Google Commerce Limited were all named as defendants in the court documents.

The presiding judge, Ekaterina Titova, deemed Entertainment Television’s demands reasonable, pointing out that the channel would likely incur “considerable losses” unless Google’s assets were frozen.

On April 13, the court rejected Entertainment Television’s first claim, lodged two days prior, in which the company demanded that all funds and property belonging to Google’s Russian subsidiary, totaling one billion rubles, be frozen.

The preliminary court hearing in this case is slated for June 1.

Entertainment Television is a company affiliated with Gazprom-Media, which owns a number of popular TV channels in Russia. Its representatives recounted how in “March 2022, YouTube effectively blocked TNT channel’s official account without any clarification, creating technical problems that prevented content from being uploaded and viewers from accessing it.” The statement went on to say that “Gazprom-Media had developed this channel and invested in its promotion on the platform, and the content posted there had been garnering tens of millions of views.”

In mid-March, the same Court of Arbitration ruled in favor of another Russian channel, ‘Tsargrad’, which had also been blocked by YouTube. Google was ordered to pay the company one billion rubles.

Since the start of Russia’s military offensive against its neighbor in late February, YouTube has blocked channels belonging to several Russian state-funded media outlets, including RT.

[TsarSamuil]

Russia fines Wikipedia.

RT.com
26 Apr, 2022 15:23

A Moscow court imposed the first-ever fine on Wikimedia Commons, the operator of the Wikipedia platform, on Tuesday. The foundation was found guilty of failing to delete articles deemed to be in violation of Russian law. Most of the content related to what was classified as the spreading of misinformation about the Russian military and its actions during the ongoing conflict in Ukraine.

The court imposed a fine of 3 million rubles (some $40,200) on the platform after it failed to delete five offending articles. Wikimedia's legal team had argued that the those on the prosecution could have fixed the articles themselves if they believed them to be violating Russian law.

“If the prosecutor believes that something is wrong in these publications, he could have come and made edits,” a lawyer said during the hearings, as quoted by RIA Novosti.

Later in the day, the same court imposed an additional fine of 2 million rubles (some $26,800) on the platform in a separate ruling over failure to delete an additional three articles. One was also related to the Russian military and Ukraine conflict, while the other two contained information on making explosives.

[TsarSamuil]

Top Western media outlet deletes video critical of Ukraine.

RT.com
6 May, 2022 17:17

Citing “discrepancies in content,” the German magazine Der Spiegel has removed a video showing the testimony of an evacuee from Mariupol’s ‘Azovstal’ factory, a stronghold of the neo-Nazi Azov militants and other Ukrainian fighters.

The woman in the video had revealed that her family were basically being lied to, held hostage, and used as human shields by the Ukrainian militants.

Another German outlet, Junge Welt, noticed the deletion on Thursday evening. According to JW, Der Spiegel published the three-minute video on Monday. It featured Natalia Usmanova, who had worked at Azovstal before the conflict and sheltered there with her husband and children.

In the recording, Usmanova tells reporters that Azov militants “kept us in the bunker” for two months and did not allow her family to leave using the humanitarian corridors established by Russian troops.

“They hid behind the fact that they are supposedly concerned about our safety,” Usmanova said, according to a German translation, adding that her family was repeatedly yelled at to “Go back to the bunker!”

“Ukraine has died for me as a state,” Usmanova said at the end of her testimony.

Der Spiegel said it had obtained the video from Reuters, and that it was temporarily taken down “because of discrepancies in content that were subsequently discovered.” Asked to specify the alleged discrepancies by RIA Novosti, Der Spiegel said they were “still in the process of clarifying this issue.”

The video published by Reuters is only a minute long, however, and has Usmanova talking about the intensity of artillery fire and the difficult life inside the bunker. Both videos come from the same interview with multiple press outlets – including RIA Novosti, which has confirmed the authenticity of Usmanova’s remarks from the now-deleted Spiegel clip.

Instead of the video, the German magazine now features a photo of Usmanova in a bus with other civilians, taken by a RIA Novosti photographer on May 1.

Usmanova’s testimony directly contradicts claims by Azov militants and the government in Kiev that Russia is preventing the evacuation of civilians from the Azovstal complex. Moscow has repeatedly opened humanitarian corridors from the area. The UN announced that another 500 civilians have been evacuated from the plant in the night between Thursday and Friday.

[TsarSamuil]

Russia kicks out Canadian state media.

RT.com
18 May, 2022 15:43

Russia has shuttered the Moscow offices of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) and revoked the visas and accreditations of its journalists. The move comes in reprisal for Ottawa’s decision to ban RT, in March, the Russian Foreign Ministry said on Wednesday.

“With regret we continue to notice open attacks on the Russian media from the countries of the so-called collective West who call themselves civilized,” Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told reporters. “A decision has been taken to make retaliatory – I emphasize, retaliatory – measures in relation to the actions of Canada.”

Russia’s response comes two months after Ottawa’s decision to ban RT broadcasts in both English and French. The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) said on March 16 that “the continued authorization to distribute RT and RT France is not in the public interest.”

The CRTC claimed that RT’s programming was “not consistent” with Canadian standards or “policy objectives,” and said it was concerned that it sought to “undermine the sovereignty of another country, demean Canadians of a particular ethnic background and undermine democratic institutions within Canada.” The decision was announced after a campaign of complaints by ethnic Ukrainian organizations.

The UK, EU, and Australian authorities have also banned RT and other Russian media organizations since the start of the conflict in Ukraine.