New Delhi: Amid investigations of RT’s coverage of the Ukraine conflict, Britain’s communications regulator Ofcom has revoked the Russian-backed broadcaster’s license.
The regulator said it did not consider RT’s licensee, ANO TV Novosti, to be “fit and proper to hold a U.K. broadcast license.”
“We have concluded that we cannot be satisfied that RT can be a responsible broadcaster in the current circumstances,” Ofcom said, AP reported.
“Ofcom is therefore revoking RT’s licence to broadcast with immediate effect,” the regulator added in its statement.
Ofcom said the decision on Friday followed 29 ongoing investigations into the impartiality of RT’s news and current affairs coverage of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Meanwhile, the aid agencies continue to ramp up their efforts to bring much-needed relief supplies to the civilians affected by the fighting as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine enters its fourth week.
The move assumes significance as over 3.2 million refugees have fled the country since the conflict began.
Rzeszow, the largest city in south-eastern Poland, has become a humanitarian aid hub for the region.
“What we have been doing is bringing more people into the country, bringing more assistance into the country, working with partners to make sure that we can work effectively, to do what we can to help,” said United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) spokesman Matthew Saltmarsh, AP reported.
The aid supplies, including food, blankets, solar lamps, warm clothing, mattresses, jerrycans and plastic sheeting, continue to arrive in a massive warehouse run by the UNHCR next to the airport outside Rzeszow, which is roughly 100 kilometres from the Ukrainian border.