A court in Simferopol blocked the Newsru.com website due to a 2019 publication about conscription in Crimea

The Zheleznodorozhny District Court of Simferopol blocked the website Newsru.com, which had ceased operation, due to a publication about the illegality of conscripting Crimeans into the Russian army. Information about this was found on the court’s website by the telegram channel “We Can Explain.”

The publication itself ceased operations a year ago due to “economic reasons” caused by the “political situation.” The editors then announced the risks associated with new laws on “foreign agents” and editorial policies that differ from the government line.

A lawsuit to block the publication's website on the territory of the Russian Federation was filed by the prosecutor of the 309th Military Prosecutor's Office. The claims were caused by the news from November 2019 “Ukraine and Human Rights Watch: conscription of Crimean residents into the Russian army is illegal and violates Art. 51 IV Geneva Convention" . The publication contains a report according to which Russia has no right to force residents of the occupied territories of Crimea to serve in its armed forces. The prosecutor's office considered that reading this publication could encourage people “to commit crimes that encroach on the foundations of the constitutional order and security of the state.”

The Railway Court sided with the prosecutor's office, finding that “the article does not recognize the results of the Crimean referendum.” “We Can Explain” noted that on June 8, the Human Rights Watch website was blocked due to a publication on the same topic. The Telegam channel suggests that the blocking is related to reports from Ukrainian human rights activists about the death of conscripts from Crimea in military operations.

• On the morning of February 24, Russia launched a “special military operation in the Donbass.” Shelling of strategically significant objects began throughout Ukraine, followed by attempts to capture cities - Kyiv, Kharkov, Mariupol and others. The day before, the DPR and LPR turned to Putin for military assistance.
• After this, Roskomnadzor demanded that the media write about the war in Ukraine only with reference to official Russian sources. Journalists were also prohibited from calling the “Russian special operation” an attack, invasion, or declaration of war. Otherwise, the supervisory authority threatened with blocking and fines of up to five million rubles. According to Roskomsvoboda, as of May 5, Roskomnadzor has already blocked more than 3,000 sites.