Nowaja Gaseta Is Closing: Kremlin Pressure Has Silenced an Independent Newspaper

TVS News AI, editorially supervised, presents Nowaja Gaseta Is Closing: Kremlin Pressure Has Silenced an Independent Newspaper.

On November 9, “Nowaja Gaseta” will switch off the lights – after 30 years of publication. Founded in 1993, the newspaper announced its closure with a dramatic statement: “They have killed us. On November 9, we will switch off the lights in our building, where we lived for 30 years.”

The end is therefore not merely a decision about a newsroom or individual issues. The newspaper cites several measures that came together immediately: the withdrawal of its financial resources, the eviction from its newsroom building, and pressure from the Russian authorities. For people in Russia who have sought an independent journalistic voice, the end of “Nowaja Gaseta” means another loss for an already severely restricted media system.

November 9 Is the End – Not a Temporary Pause

The specific announcement

The newsroom refers to November 9 as the day it will switch off the lights in its building. It therefore makes clear that the end is definitive. This corresponds to reports that the newsroom must vacate the building it has used for nearly 30 years and that the donation system for reader contributions was shut down at the same time.

“We were destroyed”

The newsroom describes this development as a “coordinated action.” The banks justified their decision by citing internal company rules. The newspaper explicitly questions this reasoning. Its argument: No bank would be satisfied with this excuse if the payments had really been stopped solely because of changes to internal regulations.

The newspaper is therefore focusing not only on its closure, but also on the possible loss of access to its financing. It explicitly states that, in addition to the eviction notice, the final withdrawal of financial resources was another reason for the closure. For a newsroom financed by donations from its readers, this measure was immediately existential.

The Strain Lasted Nearly Five Years

A tight encirclement

“Nowaja Gaseta” describes its work over the past almost five years as work “amid a dense encirclement by the secret services.” During this time, the newspaper’s websites were blocked and its registration as a media company was revoked. Journalists were also increasingly labeled “foreign agents.”

This pressure became particularly evident for its former editor-in-chief and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Dmitry Muratov. The newsroom recalled that he, too, was declared a “foreign agent.” The administrative and political pressure was therefore not limited to the publisher: it encompassed the newspaper’s websites, the classification of the company, and individual members of the newsroom.

The current editor-in-chief Sergey Sokolov and the newsroom were also affected. Criminal proceedings were opened against journalist Oleg Roldugin. Searches were conducted at the newsroom and in Sokolov’s apartment. The pressure therefore reached beyond the classification of the newspaper as a “foreign agent” and extended into the everyday life of the newsroom.

September Brought the Classification as a “Foreign Agent”

The Justice Ministry’s move

In September, the Russian Justice Ministry added “Nowaja Gaseta” to the register of “foreign agents.” This move was part of the measures that have weighed on the newspaper for nearly five years. It fits into the longer history of blocked websites, revoked media registrations, and the labeling of staff members and Dmitry Muratov.

The announcement of the closure makes clear that the strain most recently turned into a direct rupture in the newspaper’s operations. After the classification came the eviction from the building and the shutdown of the donation system. For the newsroom, these were no longer merely interventions in its public environment. Its financing and its fixed place of work were both called into question at the same time.

Another Chapter Begins with an Investigation

The case of Oleg Roldugin

The criminal proceedings opened against Oleg Roldugin are among the specifics cited in the report. Together with the searches at the newsroom and in Sergey Sokolov’s apartment, they show how far the authorities’ interference reached. These details make the newspaper’s end easier to understand: The newsroom not only had to absorb political attacks, but was also drawn into personal and legal proceedings.

The strongest counterargument to this assessment comes from the banks named. They attribute the suspended payments to internal company rules. “Nowaja Gaseta” rejects this explanation as a coordinated action and places the halt to payments in the same context as the eviction and the authorities’ classification. Because the newsroom itself has published its view of the connection, the report can only be interpreted to the extent supported by the newspaper and the state measures described.

Anna Politkovskaya Is Part of the Newspaper’s History

A murder on October 7

“Nowaja Gaseta” is closely associated with journalist Anna Politkovskaya. On October 7, 20 years ago, she was murdered in Moscow with two gunshots – on Putin’s birthday. Der Spiegel shows her editor-in-chief Sergey Sokolov at a memorial event for her.

This history makes the announced end of the medium particularly grave. Even before its final closure, the newspaper was one of the last critical voices in Russia. What ends on November 9 is therefore more than a newsroom: it is a decades-old journalistic institution whose years-long struggle against state pressure has now concluded in a permanent end.