U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson has ordered a review of the Russian-backed RT news channel’s license.
Addressing the House of Commons on Wednesday, Johnson said that Culture Secretary Nadine Dorries has asked U.K. media regulator Ofcom to review the operations of the channel, which was formerly known as Russia Today.
Johnson said: “We live in a democracy, and we live in a country that believes in free speech. And I think it’s important we leave it up to Ofcom, rather than politicians, to decide which media organizations to ban – that’s what Russia does.”
Johnson was responding to opposition leader Keir Starmer, head of the Labour Party, who had said: “Russia Today is his [Russian President Vladimir Putin’s] personal propaganda tool. I can see no reason why it should be allowed to continue broadcasting in this country.”
In her letter to Ofcom chief Melanie Dawes, Dorries wrote that the RT channel is “demonstrably part of Russia’s global disinformation campaign.” “I have concerns that broadcasters such as RT, whom Ofcom have found to have repeatedly breached the Broadcasting Code in the past, will also look to spread harmful disinformation about the ongoing crisis in Ukraine,” Dorries added.
Ofcom has said that it would act “as a priority” if there were accuracy concerns about any broadcaster.
The move is due to the ongoing tensions between Russia and the Ukraine. On Tuesday, the U.K. imposed some sanctions on Russian oligarchs and banks with links to the country, which were decried by Johnson’s detractors as too soft.
In 2019, Ofcom had fined RT £200,000 ($271,836) for breaching British broadcasting impartiality rules seven times during the 2018 Salisbury novichok poisoning incident. Russia had retaliated at the time by launching an investigation into the BBC’s Russian service.