Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine has been accompanied by a clampdown on independent media that has led an estimated 200,000 people to flee the country.
Among those to have left Russia in recent months are almost all independent journalists and activists, whose opposition to the war exposes them to state intimidation and even prosecution.
The threat is perhaps best evidenced by a recent law criminalising ‘fake news’, which makes referring to the war as a ‘war’ – rather than the Kremlin’s official designation of ‘special military operation’ – punishable by up to 15 years in prison.
