“They killed us”: the independent Russian newspaper Novaya Gazeta announces its closure under pressure from the authorities

The newspaper Novaya Gazeta, a historic bastion of the independent press in Russia, announced on Friday its closure under pressure from the Russian authorities.

“Novaya Gazeta ceases to exist. (...) The Russian authorities, the Russian special services forced the editorial staff to stop its work,” said the editor-in-chief of Novaya Gazeta, Sergei Sokolov in a statement published on YouTube.

Since the large-scale attack against Ukraine in February 2022, which Novaya Gazeta immediately opposed, the newspaper has survived in Russia in an increasingly hostile environment in the face of exacerbated political repression.

As of March 2022, it had ceased its paper publication but continued to publish content online. In September, he was classified by Moscow as a “foreign agent” – a label involving numerous administrative constraints and used to stifle any dissenting voices.

This time, its editorial staff in Russia announced that the government had finally achieved its goals. “They killed us,” she said in a statement. She specifies that she received an eviction notice forcing her to leave her historic premises in Moscow from November 9, while, at the same time, the system which allowed her to receive donations was blocked, which deprived her “entirely” of funding.

“Thirty years of a life shared with the country and its citizens will end, leaving us on the streets, without a livelihood, under the constant threat of repression,” she laments. Its editor-in-chief Sergei Sokolov accused the Kremlin of having “annihilated” human rights in Russia, the defense of which is “now equated with a crime”. “Elections and elected bodies have been, de facto, abolished. The institutions of civil society have been dismantled,” he says.

According to him, “the assassination of Novaya Gazeta” is “additional proof” that the Russian state is committing “treason” by denying its own Constitution, which notably prohibits censorship. “Thank you to everyone who listened to us,” adds Mr. Sokolov, with a somber face, announcing that a “last issue” of the newspaper will appear before its extinction.