Novaya Gazeta closes Moscow offices under official pressure

By Tom Whitfield

Novaya Gazeta, Russia’s most celebrated independent newspaper and the last major media outlet critical of the Kremlin still operating at home, closed its Moscow offices Monday.

Investigations desk editor Tatiana Britskaya said she had expected the closure almost every day for the previous 4½ years.

In an Oct. 30 statement, Novaya Gazeta said Russian authorities and the security services had “forced our editorial team to cease operations.” The statement declared: “Human rights and freedoms have been abolished in this country, and defending them is now treated as a crime.”

It added: “Elections and elected governing bodies have been effectively dismantled, civil society institutions have been wiped out, freedom of conscience and human dignity have been trampled underfoot.”

What pressure led to the closure?

Novaya Gazeta faced growing government pressure as the Kremlin cracked down on critics, with repression intensifying sharply after the start of the conflict in Ukraine. After President Vladimir Putin sent troops into Ukraine in February 2022, other major independent outlets critical of the Kremlin closed or moved operations abroad.

Russian authorities fined the newspaper after it was accused of discrediting the country’s armed forces and also declared it a foreign agent. They blocked all of its online platforms, seized its printing house, revoked its media registration and shut down the system that let readers donate.

The last measure was an order to clear the Moscow offices. The cumulative result was a newspaper without online distribution, a printing plant, registration, reader funding or a local base.

What did the newsroom lose?

Launched in 1993, Novaya Gazeta became known for fierce reporting and a dedication to uncovering Russian human rights abuses and corruption. Six of its journalists have been killed.

One was Anna Politkovskaya, who reported on atrocities during the second Chechen War at the start of Putin’s first term as president. She was fatally shot in her apartment building in 2006.

On the final day in the office Monday, journalists slowly removed portraits of their slain colleagues from the newsroom where reporters and editors planned their work.

“It is an incredibly difficult decision, because this is more than a workplace, more than an office — this is our home, and we’re losing it,” investigations desk editor Tatiana Britskaya said.

For staff, the closure meant losing the workplace and home Britskaya described.

How had pressure reshaped the leadership?

Longtime Editor-in-Chief Dmitry Muratov, who shared the 2021 Nobel Peace Prize with Philippine journalist Maria Ressa, was attacked on a train in 2022. An assailant poured red paint over him, causing severe irritation in his eyes.

Muratov stepped down as editor in 2023 after Russian authorities named him a “foreign agent.” By then, state controls on funding, distribution and registration had already placed the newspaper’s survival under direct threat.

Can the newspaper return?

As reporters left the building and gathered in the street, a new sign was affixed above the nameplate that once announced Novaya Gazeta’s office. It read, “Here lived Novaya Gazeta.”

Editor-in-Chief Sergei Sokolov believes the newspaper will return one day “with renewed strength.”

Some staff left Russia in 2022 and opened a separate project, Novaya Gazeta Europe. The new outlet has remained sharply critical of the Kremlin and its military action in Ukraine.

The next test for Novaya Gazeta is whether it can rebuild inside Russia while Novaya Gazeta Europe continues its critical work abroad.