Putin needs to control the war narrative at home over his illegal campaign in Ukraine. To do so he has resorted to a crackdown on civil society. This information is published by International Federation for Human Rights. Here is an excerpt:

The Russian authorities do not want citizens to know the truth about and oppose the country’s so-called “special operation”. Yet, the few independent voices, organisations and media outlets that remain in the country after a decade of relentless repression insist on calling things by their own name: Russia has waged war on Ukraine.

Since the invasion began on February 24, 2022, there have been daily anti-war protests across the country. As of March 4, 2022, at least 7,692 peaceful protesters had been detained in 121 Russian cities, according to OVD-Info. OVD-Info is an independent human rights media project which has been targeted by the authorities in reprisal for its work documenting violations of the rights to freedom of expression, assembly, the right to be free from arbitrary arrest and other human rights in Russia.

On February 26, 2022, Roskomnadzor, Russia’s media regulator, published a statement ordering media to remove reports describing the attack on Ukraine as an “assault”, “invasion” or a “war”. Should media outlets fail to comply with this order, they will face fines of up to 5 million rubles (approximately 53,200 Euros) and blockages. Roskomnadzor accused several independent media outlets of “spreading unreliable socially significant untrue information” about civilian deaths and the attacks of Russia against Ukrainian cities. The media regulator body further underlined that reliable information could be found in “official Russian information outlets”. That is, State-controlled media.

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