MOSCOW (Sputnik) — The Committee on Constitutional Legislation of the Russian Federation Council, the upper house of the national legislature, backed on Tuesday the law on foreign agent media and recommended that the Federation Council proceed with approving it on Wednesday.
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"Our law is too liberal, it is incomparable with the restrictions imposed [on the Russian media] in the United States. They [media] are even held criminally liable in case if they refuse to register [as foreign agents], [obliged to submit] financial data," Klishas said at the committee’s meeting.
Moreover, the set of measures which would be used in case if media,refuse to comply with provisions of the relevant law, has been already elaborated, a source in the upper house said Tuesday.
“The system has been already elaborated. It stipulates blocking of a signal,” the source said commenting on measures against broadcasters and added that same measures would be applied to media’s websites.
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The broadcaster, as well as Sputnik News Agency, have been pressured in the United States over the past few months, with US lawmakers and the intelligence community accusing the broadcaster of interfering in internal affairs and claiming that Russia had influenced both US public opinion and the 2016 presidential election outcome. However, both media outlets, as well as Russian authorities have repeatedly refuted these allegations.