Moscow: Russia's flagship independent newspaper Novaya Gazeta announced Friday it was closing, saying it had been "killed" by state pressure after years of repression targeting its journalists whose reporting was critical of the Kremlin and its Ukraine war.
The closure of Novaya Gazeta -- one of the last outlets to openly criticise Russia's offensive -- marks the latest outcome of Moscow's campaign against dissenting voices that gained speed after the Kremlin sent troops into its neighbour in 2022.
Since then, the newspaper, long considered a bastion of independent journalism, has seen its media license revoked, while its journalists and editors have been questioned, detained and had their homes searched.
It was also branded a "foreign agent" -- a label reminiscent of Soviet-era repression used to stifle dissent.
The paper's Nobel Prize-winning founder, Dmitry Muratov, told AFP the closure was "part of a giant military campaign being waged by the Russian Federation".
"We are fierce opponents of war in all its forms. And we are a part that needed to be destroyed," Muratov, the paper's former editor-in-chief, said.
Novaya Gazeta's current editor-in-chief, Sergei Sokolov, said the paper was "ending its existence" in a statement published on YouTube on Friday morning.
In the emotional video, Sokolov said that "the Russian authorities -- the Russian special services -- have forced the editorial team to end its work."
Founded in 1993 after the collapse of the Soviet Union, Novaya Gazeta was one of Russia's most reputable and renowned organisations reporting and documenting human rights abuses.
Mikhail Gorbachev, the last leader of the Soviet Union, donated some of his Nobel Peace Prize money to help set up the paper.
Rights groups slammed the move.
"Novaya Gazeta will remain THE symbol of free, pluralistic, independent, and rigorous journalism -- a model for the entire profession around the world," Reporters Without Borders chief, Thibaut Bruttin, said on Friday.
Amnesty International said the closure was a "devastating loss for everyone in Russia who turns to independent, investigative journalism to uncover the truth."
Finished off
Several Novaya Gazeta reporters have been murdered in killings widely seen as retribution for their work.
They include Anna Politkovskaya, who spent years investigating allegations of abuses by Russia's military during its campaigns in Chechnya.
She was found dead in her apartment block on President Vladimir Putin's birthday in October 2006.
Muratov, who was jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2021 for his work, had to formally step down as editor-in-chief two years later after being declared a "foreign agent".
The Norwegian Nobel Prize Committee on Friday called on Russian authorities to "end their repression of independent media".
"The closure is a grave blow to freedom of expression and the public's right to information," committee president Jorgen Watne Frydnes told AFP in an email.
Sokolov in his video statement said that Novaya Gazeta for nearly five years of war "managed to operate while completely surrounded by intelligence services. But now, that's it. We've ended up in a kill zone."
"This isn't just our own private story -- it's the story of a country and a society that are being finished off in exactly the same way."
The paper, which used to be published several times a week, cut down production inside the country after the war began, but its online version was still available despite court orders.
In recent months, the Russian authorities searched the home of Sokolov and earlier this year arrested one of its journalists, Oleg Roldugin.
"Human rights and freedoms have been abolished, and their defence has been equated with a crime," Sokolov said in the video statement, adding: "Beliefs have become state treason."
"The murder of Novaya Gazeta is yet another piece of evidence. All these years we wrote precisely about this, for as long as we could. Thank you to everyone who listened to us. And the final issue will come out."
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