Russia’s state-run RIA Novosti will shut down its Athens bureau after Greek authorities refused to renew the press accreditation for its Athens-based correspondent, the state-run news agency said Wednesday.
According to RIA Novosti, Greece’s foreign ministry declined to renew bureau chief Gennady Melnik’s 2025 accreditation without providing any explanation. The news agency, The Moscow Times reported, noted that Melnik’s 2024 accreditation was renewed with delays.
State-funded media group Rossiya Segodnya, of which RIA Novosti is part along with the Sputnik news agency and broadcaster Russia Today, called the decision “a gross violation of free speech.”
Russia’s Foreign Ministry said Greece terminated the operations of the Sputnik news agency in the country in May 2022.
RIA Novosti further claimed that Greek authorities have restricted its journalists from covering certain events over the past three years.
The news agency established its Athens bureau just ahead of the 2004 Athens Olympics and is among several Russian state media outlets sanctioned by the EU for spreading propaganda after Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine.
The Moscow Times, who reported the story, have not received a response from the Greek Foreign Ministry.
Greece’s latest move could be part of an EU-wide crackdown on Russian state-funded media across the European Union.
In May 2024, the European Council adopted a new package of sanctions against Russia, targeting its media outlets and suspending the broadcast activities of Voice of Europe, RIA Novosti, Izvestia and Rossiyskaya Gazzeta in the European Union or directed at the European Union. The Council said the sanctions were in view of “their role supporting and justifying Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine.”
The Council further said that the sanctions “do not target freedom of opinion. They include specific safeguards for freedom of expression and journalistic activities. The measures do not prevent the sanctioned outlets and their staff from carrying out other activities in the Union other than broadcasting, such as research and interviews.”
Last month, on the third anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the European Union adopted its 16th package of sanctions against Russia. The Union added eight more Russian news outlets to its sanctions list, suspending their licenses in the EU on the grounds that they spread “propaganda” and that such actions “constitute a significant and direct threat to the Union’s public order and security.”
In February 2022, the President of the European Commission Ursula Von der Leyen announced that the European Union would ban Russia Today, Russia’s flagship international broadcaster, and Sputnik (including their subsidiaries), from operating in its 27 member states.
