Russia closes CBC / Radio-Canada’s Moscow office and deprives journalists of visas and accreditation, saying it is retaliating after Canada bans Russian state television RT.
Speaking to reporters in Moscow on Wednesday, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova accused Canada and other countries of “open attacks on Russian media”.
“A decision has been taken to retaliate against Canada’s actions: closing down the Moscow office of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, including revoking the credentials and visas of their journalists,” Zakharova said in Russian, her comments quoted by Reuters.
The Russian embassy in Ottawa confirmed the development.
š¬ pic.twitter.com/AeHyAU9RYb
– @ mfa_russia
The move comes after Canada’s telecoms regulator announced on March 16 that it was removing RT and RT France, stations formerly known as Russia Today, from its list of non-Canadian programming services and stations allowed for distribution in Canada.
It was not clear why Russia waited two months to announce its decision.
Zakharova also accused Ottawa of “anti-Russian politics.” “Essentially,” she said, “the CBC has become a propaganda mouthpiece that spreads false and dubious material about our country.”
CBC “deeply disappointed”
CBC News Editor-in-Chief Brody Fenlon said Russia’s decision was “very disappointing”.
CBC News and its journalists are completely and utterly independent of any government or agency, so we have nothing to do with them [regulatory] solutions. We were there to report on what was happening in Russia – in fact, [and] exactly, āFenlon said in an interview.
Correspondent Brier Stewart, pictured in January 2022, works at the CBC Moscow office in the historic Boiler House on the banks of the Moskva River. (CBC)
“Obviously we know that freedom of the media and the press in Russia is severely restricted. I guess we are the latest proof of that.”
CBC / Radio-Canada has maintained a Moscow office for more than 44 years and was the only Canadian news organization with a permanent presence in the country. His bureau had nine employees, including editorial and administrative staff, some of whom were locally employed Russians.
This is believed to be the first time a foreign government has ordered the closure of a CBC office.
The CBC and other news outlets, including the BBC and Bloomberg, stopped reporting from the ground in Russia in March after Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a bill imposing a sentence of up to 15 years in prison for disseminating information contrary to the Russian government’s position. for the war in Ukraine.
On Wednesday, Fenlon said the CBC would continue to cover Russia outside the country.
The federal government has criticized Russia’s decision
Speaking to reporters in Ottawa, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called Russia’s decision “pathetic but not surprising.”
“The truth, responsible journalism, sharing what is really happening to the citizens, is a deep threat to Vladimir Putin and his illegal war with authoritarian tendencies,” Trudeau told reporters.
“Canada will always advocate for a free, strong independent press that does its job of challenging and revealing what is happening in the world.
Heritage Minister Pablo Rodriguez contrasted the decision of the Canadian Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) to remove RT from Canadian airwaves and Russia’s decision to close the CBC office in Moscow.
“This is a completely independent decision of the CRTC … I asked the CRTC to make an inquiry, to consult with the Canadians, which they did for two weeks. They met with hundreds of people and made a very detailed decision, 7,000 – a decision of the word. This is happening in Canada. In Russia, a journalist is simply expelled. “It’s a big difference,” Rodriguez told Parliament Hill reporters.
WATCH The Minister of Heritage reacted to the news that Russia is closing the CBC Moscow office:
The Minister of Heritage reacted to the news that Russia is closing the CBC Moscow office
Heritage Minister Pablo Rodriguez said he was grateful to Canadian journalists for their hard work and said that Russian President Vladimir Putin had taken this action to hide “the terrible reality that is happening in Ukraine.”
Canada on global issues tweets that it is in contact with CBC / Radio-Canada and that its staff in Moscow are “ready to help them if necessary.”
Other Western countries, including the European Union, have banned RT and Russia’s Sputnik news agency since the start of the war in Ukraine.
In February, after Germany blocked RT broadcasts, Russia responded by closing the Moscow office of German television station Deutsche Welle and taking away its journalists’ credentials.
Sanctions continue
Last month, Russia announced sanctions against 61 Canadians, including CBC President Catherine Tate and several journalists from other media.
Canada on Tuesday introduced a bill in the Senate that would ban Putin and about 1,000 members of his government and military from entering the country as it continues to tighten sanctions over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on February 24.
Many foreign journalists, as well as Russian journalists working for independent news outlets, have left Russia since March after Putin signed a law imposing harsh prison sentences for spreading deliberately “fake” military news.
Russian officials do not use the word “invasion” and say the Western media has provided a biased account of the war in Ukraine that ignores Russia’s concerns about NATO enlargement and the alleged persecution of Russian-speakers.
The CBC News Office in Moscow, pictured in March 2020, is housed in the historic Kotelnicheskaya Embankment building on the banks of the Moskva River. (CBC)
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has repeatedly rebuked the West for what he called undemocratic repression against Russian state media organizations, which he said provided an alternative to Western stories.
Putin describes the war as an inevitable confrontation with the United States, which he accuses of threatening Russia by interfering in its backyard and expanding the military alliance of the North Atlantic Treaty.
Ukraine says it is fighting an imperial-style seizure of land and that Putin’s allegations of genocide and persecution of Russian-speakers are nonsense.
Add Comment