5 Sep 2022 13:04

Court in Moscow annuls Novaya Gazeta registration as media outlet

MOSCOW. Sept 5 (Interfax) - Moscow's Basmanny District Court has upheld a motion from the Federal Service for Supervision of Communications, Information Technology and Mass Media (Roskomnadzor) and declared the media outlet registration of the Novaya Gazeta printed version null and void, an Interfax correspondent said in a report.

"To declare the media outlet's registration null and void," Judge Olga Lipkina said on Monday.

The ruling will be appealed, Novaya Gazeta Editor-in-Chief Dmitry Muratov said. "We will go all the way," Muratov told reporters after the ruling was pronounced. "There is not a single legal reason" for this ruling, he said.

Roskomnadzor served as the administrative plaintiff in the case, while PJSC Novaya Gazeta Publishing house was the respondent.

Roskomnadzor said earlier it had appealed to a court for the invalidation of the Novaya Gazeta registration due to the failure to present the editorial charter by the time specified by law despite earlier warnings.

A representative of Novaya Gazeta asked the court to dismiss the regulator's motion and said that the latter viewed the non-submission of the charter of the media outlet registered in 2002 after the 2006 changes in the composition of the founders as a violation.

In the opinion of the respondent, the change of founder does not mean that the newspaper started working as a new media outlet, which made the charter's submission unnecessary and the Roskomnadzor demands unreasonable.

On September 6, the Basmanny District Court will process Roskomnadzor's motion for the invalidation of the Novaya Rasskaz-Gazeta magazine, a supplement to Novaya Gazeta. The Russian Supreme Court will meet on September 15 to consider the possible termination of the Novaya Gazeta website, requested by Roskomnadzor.

Novaya Gazeta suspended operations on March 28 after receiving two written warnings from Roskomnadzor over a failure to label its content as that of a foreign-agent NGO.

Some members of the newspaper staff launched a new project in Europe.