Russian internet and communications regulator Roskomnadzor drew up protocols under the administrative offences code against the editor-in-chief of New Times, Evgenia Albats, as well as the founder of the newspaper, for disseminating what it said was “false information” about the Russian armed forces. “For the dissemination of deliberately unreliable publicly significant information, Roskomnadzor drew up two protocols against the founder and two against the editor-in-chief of The New Times under part 9 of article 13.15 of the Code of Administrative Offenses of the Russian Federation,” it said. The department stated that “the specified resource posted publications containing unreliable socially significant information about the course of a special military operation of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation in Ukraine.” According to the Code of Administrative Offenses, part 9 of article 13.15 of the Code of Administrative Offenses provides for fines of between 200,000 to 500,000 rubles. The news website of the NYT was blocked on the 28 February by Roskomnadzor in relation to the publication’s coverage of the Ukraine war.
UPDATE: On 20 July, a court in Moscow found Evgeniya Albats and The New Times guilty of spreading “fake news” related to the war in Ukraine. The newspaper was fined 700,000 rubles, while Albats herself received a 70,000 ruble fine. The Russian journalist had already received a fine in March for allegedly violating the same article of Russia’s code of administrative offences.