Russia investigates BBC as Britain dispute escalates

MOSCOW: Russia’s media regulator said on Friday it had launched an investigation into the activities of British public broadcaster BBC, a move it described as a response to pressure being put on a Russian TV channel in Britain.

Roskomnadzor, the regulator, said in a statement it was looking into the activities of the BBC World News channel and BBC websites to see if they complied with Russian law. It said its checks were in response to a decision by British media regulator Ofcom, which on Thursday said that Russian broadcaster RT had broken impartiality rules in some of its news and current affairs programmes.

The Kremlin said Russian government agencies had repeatedly raised concerns about the BBC’s coverage of Russia and of Moscow’s actions in Syria.

BBC said it was in full compliance, while Ofcom declined to comment.

The British regulator had on Thursday said it was considering imposing some kind of sanction on RT, which is financed by the Russian state. It took issue in particular with its coverage of the poisoning in Britain of former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter. Britain has accused agents working for Russia’s military intelligence agency, the GRU, of committing the crime, an allegation Moscow denies.