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Russia names Bellingcat reporting partner a 'foreign agent'
Source: The Guardian
Russia names Bellingcat reporting partner a ‘foreign agent’
Move against the Insider seen as revenge for part in revealing Kremlin’s role in Salisbury and other assassination attempts
Andrew Roth in Moscow
Fri 23 Jul 2021 17.38 BST
Russia has named a local partner of the Bellingcat investigative journalism collective as a “foreign agent” in an apparent act of revenge for helping reveal the Kremlin’s role in the Salisbury poisonings and assassination attempts by the security agencies.
Russia’s justice ministry on Friday named the Insider, an investigative website, along with five journalists for other publications as “foreign agents”, a label that implied the news agencies and individual reporters were taking foreign money to influence Russian politics.
The designation requires the outlets to label all their content and is said to scare off potential partners and advertisers. Organisations that are deemed as failing to comply with the law can be forced to shut.
“Regarding the inclusion of the Insider on the justice ministry’s list, we declare that our newsroom will continue to operate,” the Insider said in a statement. “We will continue to familiarise readers with societally important information in its complete and uncensored form in accordance with Latvian laws and common sense.” The Insider’s headquarters are in Riga, although its journalists often work in Russia
The Insider has been one of several new investigative websites to publish blockbuster exposes embarrassing to the Kremlin. Alongside Bellingcat, it helped to reveal the identity of two GRU agents believed to have carried out the Salisbury poisonings, an FSB hit squad behind the poisoning attack on the opposition leader Alexei Navalny, and other assassination attempts and alleged acts of subterfuge by Russian agents in Europe.
-snip-
Move against the Insider seen as revenge for part in revealing Kremlin’s role in Salisbury and other assassination attempts
Andrew Roth in Moscow
Fri 23 Jul 2021 17.38 BST
Russia has named a local partner of the Bellingcat investigative journalism collective as a “foreign agent” in an apparent act of revenge for helping reveal the Kremlin’s role in the Salisbury poisonings and assassination attempts by the security agencies.
Russia’s justice ministry on Friday named the Insider, an investigative website, along with five journalists for other publications as “foreign agents”, a label that implied the news agencies and individual reporters were taking foreign money to influence Russian politics.
The designation requires the outlets to label all their content and is said to scare off potential partners and advertisers. Organisations that are deemed as failing to comply with the law can be forced to shut.
“Regarding the inclusion of the Insider on the justice ministry’s list, we declare that our newsroom will continue to operate,” the Insider said in a statement. “We will continue to familiarise readers with societally important information in its complete and uncensored form in accordance with Latvian laws and common sense.” The Insider’s headquarters are in Riga, although its journalists often work in Russia
The Insider has been one of several new investigative websites to publish blockbuster exposes embarrassing to the Kremlin. Alongside Bellingcat, it helped to reveal the identity of two GRU agents believed to have carried out the Salisbury poisonings, an FSB hit squad behind the poisoning attack on the opposition leader Alexei Navalny, and other assassination attempts and alleged acts of subterfuge by Russian agents in Europe.
-snip-
Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jul/23/russia-brands-local-bellingcat-reporting-partner-as-foreign-agent