Russia labels editor and Nobel winner Dmitry Muratov 'foreign agent'

Dmitry Muratov has condemned Russia's invasion of Ukraine

The Russian authorities have added the renowned editor and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Dmitry Muratov to their list of "foreign agents" - a label used to stifle critics of the Kremlin.

His independent Novaya Gazeta newspaper stopped publishing in Russia last March, after the Kremlin imposed tight controls on media covering Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

Many Kremlin critics and civil society groups are on the "foreign agent" list.

In the past the label implied spying.

Mr Muratov was co-awarded the peace prize in 2021 in recognition of his fight to defend freedom of expression in Russia. The other laureate was Philippines democracy campaigner Maria Ressa.

He auctioned off his Nobel medal to raise money for Ukrainian refugees.

Novaya Gazeta journalists fled to Latvia last year and launched a new online publication, called Novaya Gazeta Europe.

Russia's justice ministry on Friday accused Mr Muratov of "creating and disseminating work produced by foreign agents" and said he "used foreign media to promote opinions that are aimed at forming a negative attitude towards Russia's interior and foreign policy".

Despite the pressure from the authorities he is still living in Russia. In June he joined the defence team of Oleg Orlov, co-chair of the human rights group Memorial, which was prosecuted under the "foreign agents" law.

Mr Orlov is on trial in Moscow accused of discrediting the Russian armed forces.

Any individual labelled a foreign media agent has to register and provide details of activities and finances every six months. All their material, including social media messages, has to contain a long message indicating their status as a foreign agent. The list has been expanded to include many critics of Kremlin policies.

Mr Muratov edited Novaya Gazeta for more than two decades. The liberal paper got funding from the late Mikhail Gorbachev, the last Soviet leader.

Since 2000 six of the paper's journalists and collaborators have been killed.

Among them was investigative reporter Anna Politkovskaya, who exposed human rights abuses by Russian forces and their allies in Chechnya.