Lithuanian Foreign Minister Linas Linkevicius on Thursday recommended the Radio and TV Commission of the country to ban the broadcasting of RT channels just days after a similar measure was introduced by neighboring Latvia
MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 02nd July, 2020) Lithuanian Foreign Minister Linas Linkevicius on Thursday recommended the Radio and tv Commission of the country to ban the broadcasting of RT channels just days after a similar measure was introduced by neighboring Latvia.
On Tuesday, the Latvian National Electronic Media Council said that it was banning seven RT channels, namely RT, RT HD, RT Arabic, RT Spanish, RT Documentary HD, RT Documentary and RT TV, saying that they were owned by Dmitry Kiselev, who is under EU sanctions. Kiselev is the director general of the Rossiya Segodnya international information agency, while the editor-in-chief of RT is Margarita Simonyan, who is not under any sanctions. The two companies are separate legal entities.
"Today I recommended that Radio & Television Commission of #Lithuania bans broadcasting in [Lithuanian flag] TV programmes of 'Russia Today', a Russian international TV network, directly controlled by EU-blacklisted Mr. Dmitry Kiseliov," Linkevicius tweeted.
Simonyan, when commenting on a possible RT ban in Lithuania, mocked the bans and said that now Estonia too might soon follow suit "to protect its Arabic and Spanish speaking population from RT."
Russian media in Baltic states have been frequently targeted by authorities. The Russian Foreign Ministry has accused the three nations of a coordinated crackdown on the media, which is not in line with the principle of freedom of expression.
