Moscow court revokes license of Novaya Gazeta

A Moscow court has revoked the license of Novaya Gazeta, an independent publication that was partially funded by former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev’s 1990 Nobel Peace Prize money.

Less than a year ago, in 2021, the editor-in-chief of the publication, Dmitry Muratov, received the Nobel Peace Prize.

A district court announced on Monday that it revoked the publishing license at the request of the country’s media regulatory agency – Roskomnadzor. 

Roskomnadzor filed a complaint against one of the last independent publications in Russia, at the end of July. 

It claimed that after the change of owner, the editorial board of the newspaper failed to submit a new charter of publication to the Ministry of Justice. 

The lawyers of Novaya Gazeta said that the changes made in 2006 did not require the submission of the charter to state agencies.

“This is a whimsical and completely political decision, it has no legal basis,” Muratov tweeted.

Novaya Gazeta was launched in 1993 and until recently remained one of the most authoritative publications in post-Soviet Russia.