9 Russian channels were banned in Latvia
The Latvian National Council for Electronic Media has decided to stop broadcasting nine Russian-language channels in the country, a PolitNavigator correspondent reports.
The Delfi portal reports this.
It is reported that the banned channels are part of the “National Media Group” of businessman Yuri Kovalchuk, who is subject to EU sanctions.
“Among these nine channels there are channels such as “Petersburg-Channel Five”, “Dom Kino”, which are very serious programs,” the Delfi portal quotes deputy chairman of the council Ivars Abolins as saying. “This ban will be in force until Yuri Kovalchuk is removed from the EU sanctions list,” Abolins clarified. According to him, the council also checks the owners of other TV channels.
According to the department, the banned channels included “Time: Far and Near”, “Beaver”, “House of Cinema”, “House of Cinema Premium”, “Music of the First”, “O!”, “Let’s Go”, “Telecafe” and “Petersburg-Channel Five”.
The Permanent Mission of the Russian Federation to the OSCE expressed Russia's concern about the decision of the Latvian authorities and called on the OSCE to respond to the ban.
Kovalchuk was one of the first to be added to the US sanctions list in 2014 - the US Treasury Department considers him a member of President Vladimir Putin’s inner circle.
Among the channels banned in Latvia, only Channel Five can be called news. Although most of its airtime is occupied by the TV series “Sled”, “Investigator-2” and “Conditional Ment”, the channel broadcasts news releases “Izvestia” five times a day. Documentary films about singers Yulia Nachalova, Sergei Lazarev and Abraham Russo are scheduled for the weekend this week.
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