In Crimea (annexed by Russia), 30 Ukrainian websites are blocked, advocates report

In Crimea (annexed by Russia), 30 information websites are currently completely or partly inaccessible. Media coordinator of Crimean Advocacy Group, Iryna Sedova, reported about monitoring accessibility of Ukrainian online websites on the territory of the peninsula in the Hromadske radio program. According to her, the advocates checked acessibility of Ukrainian news websites in 5 cities of Crimea — Kerch, Simferopol, Sevastopol, Bilohorsk and Yalta. It turned out that in different cities these websites are being blocked in a different manner. 9 websites are blocked in all 5 cities, but other ones are blocked randomly - they work in some cities but not in others. For example, in Simferopol, 28 websites from the list are blocked, but in Kerch - only 11. The advocates claim that most of these blockings are illegal even based on Russian laws. Only 6 websites from the list are in the Roskomnadzor list of websites blocked based on court resolutions. Sedova also mentioned that only 4 of those 30 Ukrainian news websites are blocked in Moscow. “These are Censor.NET, Hromadske Radio, RBK and SLED.net. There are court resolutions for them”, she said.