‘They’ve killed "Novaya Gazeta"’: Pressure from the Kremlin forces the closure of Russia’s leading voice for free journalism

Pressure from the regime of Vladimir Putin's regime to control all information has claimed its first victim. The newspaper Novaya Gazeta, one of Russia's leading media outlets and a staunch opponent of the president, announced its closure, citing the pressure it had faced from the Kremlin in recent years.

November 9 will be its last day of operation, after more than three decades of reporting in Russia.

"They have killed Novaya Gazeta," said its editor-in-chief, Sergei Sokolov, who was recently interrogated and detained for hours by Russian authorities.

"On November 9, we will turn off the lights in our home, where we have lived for 30 years. We will shut down the servers and leave," he added, in remarks reported by AFP.

The closure of the publication, one of the few media outlets that criticized Russia's offensive in Ukraine, marks a new milestone in the Kremlin's campaign against dissent.

Since the conflict began in 2022, Russia has imposed levels of censorship comparable to those of the Soviet era, forcing the vast majority of independent journalists into exile.

Since March of that year, the newspaper had ceased print publication but continued to publish online. In September, it was classified by Moscow as a "foreign agent," a label used to silence the opposition.

The staff members stated that they had received an eviction notice requiring them to vacate their Moscow newsroom as of November 9 and that, at the same time, they had blocked the system through which they received donations, which left them "completely" without funding.

Some of the journalists at Novaya Gazeta fled the country in 2022 and launched a new outlet from abroad, Novaya Gazeta Europe, which was declared an "undesirable organization" by Russia, which banned it.