Kremlin: Russia prepares ‘mirror response’ to the fine against RT TV channel in the UK
RosKomNadzor (RKN), Russia’s federal agency for censorship of media and telecommunications, is preparing a “mirror response to the biased treatment of Russian media abroad”, the agency announced on its official website on August 1. Draft amendments to the law on foreign media will be put forward in Russia’s State Duma over the next 10 days, and will prescribe fines “well into the millions”, RKN executive Aleksandr Zharov told Interfax. The censorship agency noted that it has already given multiple warnings about such “mirror responses” from Moscow.
RKN’s statement came after the UK fined the RT TV channel £200,000. The fine was given by the British media regulator Ofcom for RT’s violation of the principles of impartiality. The regulator made such claims about seven of RT’s stories, including the poisoning of Sergey Skripal and his daughter in Salisbury, the conflict in Syria, and nationalism in Ukraine. All of these stories were broadcast between March and April 2018. Ofcom drew attention to the violations in December 2018, and fined RT on 26 July 2019. The regulator noted that it will not demand payment of the £200,000 fine until all of the necessary legal procedures have been completed.
RT claims that the fine is excessive and differs significantly from the fines given to other channels, even for more serious offenses, such as hate speech or calls to violence. Ofcom has only accused RT of “inadequate objectivity”.
In December 2018, when the accusations were brought against RT, RKN immediately began evaluating the BBC World News channel. By January, the Russian censorship agency announced that it had identified violations, although it did not specify what they were.