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18Mar22

British media regulator Ofcom revokes RT's license to broadcast in UK

Ofcom, the British media regulator, has revoked RT TV channel's license to broadcast in the UK upon the government's request, according to a statement on Friday.

"Ofcom has today revoked RT's license to broadcast in the UK, with immediate effect. We have done so on the basis that we do not consider RT's licensee, ANO TV Novosti, fit and proper to hold a UK broadcast license," the statement reads.

It said the license revocation came amid 29 ongoing Ofcom inspections regarding "the impartiality of RT's coverage of Russia's invasion of Ukraine."

Ofcom specified in the statement that "RT is currently off air in the UK, as a result of sanctions imposed by the EU since the invasion of Ukraine commenced." According to the statement, the regulator doubts that RT can be a "responsible broadcaster."

Commenting on the revocation of RT's broadcasting license by British media regulator Ofcom, Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters that RT would continue to make its point to those who want to hear it.

"The world is much bigger and much more complicated than the European continent, and RT will continue, I have no doubt, to carry its voice and point of view to those who want to see and hear it," the Kremlin spokesman said.

Earlier, on February 23, UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson, speaking in the House of Commons of the British Parliament, announced that the government had asked Ofcom to reconsider its decision to grant RT a broadcasting license. The Russian Embassy in London had previously repeatedly drawn attention to the inadmissibility of pressure by the British authorities on the activities of Russian media operating in the country, calling such actions a restriction on freedom of speech.

[Source: Tass, London, 18Mar22]
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