Estonia Mulling Ban On RT Channels Broadcasting - Foreign Ministry

HELSINKI (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 07th July, 2020) The Estonian government is weighing the possibility, following Latvia's example, to prohibit the broadcasting of Russia Today television channels in the country, Estonian Foreign Minister Urmas Reinsalu said.

The Latvian National Electronic Media Council said last week it was banning seven RT channels, namely RT, RT HD, RT Arabic, RT Spanish, RT Documentary HD, RT Documentary and RT tv, saying that they were headed by Rossiya Segodnya Director-General Dmitry Kiselev, who is under EU sanctions. Notably, RT and Rossiya Segodnya are two different legal entities and the former is not chaired by Kiselev.

Margarita Simonyan, RT's editor-in-chief, is not under any EU sanctions.

According to Reinsalu, he approves of Latvia's actions, but in order to take the same steps in Estonia, an analysis will be carried out that should confirm that restricting the channel's broadcasting was the right step to implement financial sanctions.

"We are talking only about those pro-Kremlin channels whose beneficiaries are those on the sanctions list," the foreign minister told the Delfi portal.