Yle’s news sites in Finnish, Russian and English are no longer accessible in Russia without a VPN.
The Russian Federal Communications Supervisory Authority, Roskomnadzor, has blocked most Yle services in Russia. The yle.fi site appeared in Roskomnadzor’s register of banned sites on Thursday. The decision to block the yle.fi domain was taken by the Prosecutor General’s Office of Russia on May 27.
Yle Internet services in Finnish, Yle News and Yle Novosti sites are currently unavailable in Russia. The Yle site also offers services in the Sami and Ukrainian languages. The site is however accessible via a VPN connection.
The Svenska Yle website in Swedish is still accessible in Russia without restrictions.
The list of websites banned by Roskomnadzor includes the Finnish newspapers Helsingin Sanomat and Ilta-Sanomat, as well as the Danish Politiken. The bans were imposed because of Russian-language articles reporting on Russia’s war in Ukraine.
Russian authorities have blocked access to dozens of Russian and foreign media. Among them are the British broadcaster BBC, the Estonian newspaper Postimees, the German broadcaster Deutsche Welle, as well as the Russian television channel Dozhd and the radio station Ekho Moskvy (Echo of Moscow).
