A number of countries took action against Russia's invasion of Ukraine. The trick is to close broadcasts from Russia.
Australia's SBS TV station announced that it had stopped broadcasting Russia Today (RT) and NTV Moscow. Reporting from TVTonight Australia, Sunday (27/2/2022) this decision was taken after receiving input from the Russian-speaking community in Australia.
Besides SBS, there is Foxtel, an over the top service in Australia. Foxtel initially continued to support RT broadcasts. The Foxtel network via its Flash news streaming service is still showing RT news, whose position is to defend Russia and blame Ukraine.
Channel Flash features news from 14 Australian and international news agencies. Options include BBC World News, CNN, Sky News Australia and Russia Today. The diversity of this channel is to give viewers a different point of view on world issues.
A Foxtel spokesman said they do not endorse content from their news channel providers including Russia Today. But they said they were still monitoring the situation.
Finally Foxtel changed its mind on Saturday (26/2). They announced they were shutting down RT broadcasts as a result of the situation in Ukraine.
The RT also responded to Australia's policies. They denied that their reporting was not neutral.
"RT's activities and reporting are independent of the government and protected by law," said RT's Deputy Chief Executive Officer, Anna Belkina.
Apart from Australia, the closure of Russian broadcasts also occurred in Poland and Germany. In retaliation, the Russian government shut down the German Deutsche Welle broadcast in the Land of the Red Bear.