Mirror measures to Deutsche Welle: "Good should be able to defend itself!"

The decision of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation to terminate the work of the German broadcasting company Deutsche Welle in Russia caused a strong resonance both in our country and abroad.

Let's recall that as the "first stage" of retaliatory measures to ban the broadcasting of the Russian German-language TV channel RT DE in Germany, the Russian Foreign Ministry provides for the following actions: the closure of the Deutsche Welle office in Russia and the termination of satellite and other broadcasting on the territory of our country, the cancellation of all employees accreditation of the TV company in Russia and the beginning of the procedure for recognising Deutsche Welle as a foreign agent.

In parallel, a "black list" of persons involved in "putting pressure on the Russian media operator RT DE in Germany will be compiled. In the future, they will be banned from entering Russia. This is reported on the official website of the diplomatic department.

As the official representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry Mariya Zakharova noted, the "reciprocity" on the part of Russia in this matter was due to the persistent unwillingness of the German side to comply with legal obligations and ignoring proposals for compromise solutions.

"Berlin just should not say now that they weren't offered to stay within the international legal framework. We did offer. Repeatedly and at various levels. We have identified solutions to the problems that were not created by us. But if the German information and political machine has rolled over its obligations in the field of protecting freedom of speech, then we have nothing to be embarrassed about responding reciprocally", the diplomat wrote on her Telegram channel.

Following the decision of the Foreign Ministry, on behalf of the Chairman of the State Duma Vyacheslav Volodin, the journalists of the German company were denied access to the lower chamber. "Stop constantly being taken for a ride and stoically endure humiliation. If they behave with us this way, so then we do the same with them. Good should be able to defend itself!" said Deputy Aleksandr Khinshtein, commenting on the event.

As expected, Moscow's countermeasures provoked the indignation of representatives of state and public structures in Germany. For example, the Minister for Culture and Media Claudia Roth said that "the ban on Deutsche Welle broadcasting in Russia and the closure of its office in Moscow are absolutely unacceptable”.

Claudia Roth argued her position by saying that the situation with the ban on the broadcasting of the Russian TV channel RT DE in Germany is a "different thing". It was precisely with this hashtag that Mariya Zakharova commented on the speech of the German minister, adding that “all of this is very funny”.

On Russian social networks, Ms. Roth's attack gave rise to jokes: the difference is that Deutsche Welle had a "warm, settled place in Russia”, and the Russian TV channel was not even given the opportunity to start work.

The words of Peter Limburg, CEO of Deutsche Welle, also fall under the policy of double standards, that bans on the work of the media are possible only in autocracies. "We protest against this absurd reaction of the Russian government and will take the measures provided for by law," he added.

The head of the German Journalists Association, Frank Ueberall, also did not adhere to the principles of political correctness. It is reported that he called the actions of the Russian Foreign Ministry a "cheap reaction”. He said the Russian TV channel is "propaganda", and that the German one "offers independent and critical journalism".

The German Journalists Association appealed to Russian President Vladimir Putin with a demand to cancel measures against Deutsche Welle. At the same time, as Mariya Zakharova noted, it was "the German Journalists Association that was loudest to demand limiting the work of RT DE”.

It is obvious that the problem will not resolve itself and tensions will increase. France and Great Britain have already thrown their two cents into the conflict situation. According to Mariya Zakharova, this is a planned action.

"We cannot, I emphasise, not consider all of this as a package. It is difficult to separate the attacks on the French office of RT from what is happening with their colleagues in Germany and these unambiguous statements made by the British Foreign Ministry and, of course, those alleged reports that were published a little more than a week ago on the website of the US State Department. Four countries - the USA, Germany and France, well, and Britain is also singing along - have declared a real war on the Russian RT TV channel over the past few days," she said.

The diplomat sees the reason for the arranged scandal as the desire of the West to promote its Anglo-Saxon theses into the information space and block any counterarguments of other parties.

Probably, the West habitually did not expect to receive any resistance from Russia, and the retaliatory measures came as a surprise to it. It is to be hoped that our state will continue to defend its positions in this and other issues of principle for us.