Novaya Gazeta has announced it is ceasing operations. The editorial team is being evicted from its office in Moscow.

Novaya Gazeta has announced that it will cease operations on 9 November. On that day, the editorial team must leave the office on Potapovsky Lane in Moscow, where journalists have worked for nearly 30 years.

“On 9 November, we will turn off the lights in our home, where we have lived for 30 years, shut down the servers and leave. There is no more newspaper. The Russian authorities and Russian security services have forced the editorial team to stop working,” the statement reads.

The editorial team writes that, along with the demand to vacate the premises, their reader donation system was also disconnected. Novaya Gazeta describes this as a “coordinated action.”

The editorial team clarifies that a final issue of the newspaper will still be released. Earlier, the newsroom reported on the impending eviction from its Moscow office.

“We are simply being kicked out, given the bare minimum time to pack. The Anna Politkovskaya Museum is being closed, and portraits of our friends who have been killed are being taken down from the walls,” the editorial team wrote in a letter to readers.

The Anna Politkovskaya Museum, dedicated to the Novaya Gazeta columnist, was opened on 7 October 2021—the 15th anniversary of her murder—in the journalist’s former office, number 307. Politkovskaya was shot dead on 7 October 2006 in the lift of her building in Moscow. The museum preserves her writing desk, computer, glasses, letters and other personal belongings.

• In April, there was a search carried out at Novaya Gazeta’s Moscow office. Law enforcement officers did not allow lawyers into the building. It was later revealed that the investigation was connected to a criminal case against investigative journalist Oleg Roldugin regarding the unlawful use of personal data.
• In September, the Ministry of Justice added Novaya Gazeta to the “foreign agents” register. After this, the publication was unable to restore its donation system: businesses and banks refused to cooperate with the editorial team, citing internal policies.

13:50 A few days ago, Novaya Gazeta staff discovered signs that their Moscow office had been broken into. As reported by Mediazona, quoting The Economist, an unknown person entered the editorial office overnight on 26 October. Subsequently, publisher Dmitry Muratov and editor-in-chief Sergey Sokolov gathered staff in the basement of a neighbouring building without phones, as speaking inside the main office was deemed unsafe. Those present saw the break-in as an escalation of pressure and concluded that “the time has come to close the publication.”

14:41 Novaya Gazeta did not confirm The Economist’s report about the break-in. When asked by the “Defence Word” project about the reliability of the publication, Sokolov responded: “The only reliable information is what’s in the editorial statement.”

This story has been updated to reflect information about the break-in at Novaya Gazeta’s office.