The Ministry of Justice of the Russian Federation has included the Dozhd TV channel and the legal entity of the Internet publication Important Stories Istories fonds, registered in Latvia, into registry Media-foreign agents.
The list also includes the editor-in-chief of “Important stories” Roman Anin and other journalists of the publication: Alesya Marakhovskaya, Irina Dolinina, Roman Shleinov, Stepan Petrov, Dmitry Velikovsky and Olesya Shmagun.
Foreign legal entities and Russian individuals included in the register are obliged to register a Russian legal entity within a month, which will be the “organizer of distribution” of information materials. This legal entity will be subject to the same obligations as NGOs – foreign agents (that is, the obligation to submit a lot of reports to the Ministry of Justice, undergo an annual audit, etc.).
People included in the register of “natural persons-foreign agents” are obliged to submit to the Ministry of Justice reports on their activities and spending of funds once every six months. In addition, all distributed materials must be marked with a foreign agency label. Failure to fulfill these obligations is punished.