5.3.22
On World Press Freedom Day, a look at how Russia's media has evolved since the 1990s: 37 journalists have been murdered in Russia since Vladimir Putin took office in 2000. On August 19, 1991, when Soviet television broadcast Tchaikovsky's "Swan Lake" for hours instead of the usual news, citizens quickly concluded something was amiss. Decline of media landscape since 2000. Berezovsky's pro-Kremlin ORT channel supported Putin in his bid for the presidency and helped him win in 2000. However, Putin has long since reined in the free press. Immediately after taking office, he began to bring the media under state control. The broadcaster NTV was spectacularly crushed. Heavily armed security forces entered the newsroom; part of that was broadcast live. Under various pretexts and charges, the owner Gusinsky was deprived of his power step by step," Gruska explains. With every year, more and more free voices in the country fell silent: After the demonstrations in the winter of 2011/2012 against alleged falsifications in the parliamentary election and after the annexation of Crimea and the outbreak of war in Donbas in 2014, control tightened even more."
Moscow has recognized the relevance of the internet and silenced all independent media with a series of legislative changes. Currently, platforms such as Instagram and Facebook, as well as pages of foreign media houses, can only be accessed via a Virtual Private Network (VPN) access. The media supervisory authority Roskomnadzor can block platforms at any time, and computers or smartphones must be preloaded with Russian programs by default. International organizations that are politically active in Russia and receive funding from abroad must register as "foreign agents" with the state registry. Fines and prison sentences are common. After the Russian invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022, the last independent media were successively muzzled -- even those thought to be protected by their popularity. The vast majority of all independent journalists who have worked at the national level are now abroad. And from there, their voices can hardly be heard in the motherland -- power structures with repressive measures and internet blocks make sure of that. "The situation of the media in Russia today is reminiscent of the darkest and most difficult times of the Soviet Union," says Gruska.
