Roskomnadzor tries to block Novy Chas website, outlet responds with new mirror

At the end of April, a mir­ror site of the inde­pen­dent Belaru­sian news out­let Novy Chas, which had bypassed cen­sor­ship in Belarus for a year, became inac­ces­si­ble from Belarus and Rus­sia. On May 1, Ama­zon, which hosts the mir­ror, noti­fied the out­let of a com­plaint from Roskom­nad­zor — Rus­si­a’s media and com­mu­ni­ca­tions watch­dog — claim­ing legal vio­la­tions.

The com­plaint did not spec­i­fy which laws were alleged­ly bro­ken or by which coun­try. Novy Chas says it respond­ed with­in 24 hours as required, and no tech­ni­cal con­se­quences fol­lowed.

Instead of ask­ing to unblock the old mir­ror, the edi­to­r­i­al team launched a new one, call­ing Roskom­nad­zor’s actions a rou­tine attempt to pres­sure inde­pen­dent media.

“They send com­plaints hop­ing some­one won’t respond or han­dle the tech,” a Novy Chas rep­re­sen­ta­tive said. “But we’re pre­pared — they chase, we run.”

The out­let believes the com­plaints may be linked to ear­li­er inclu­sion in Russ­ian black­lists due to cov­er­age of Ukraine-relat­ed top­ics like Bucha and Mar­i­upol mas­sacres.

Novy Chas says it will con­tin­ue report­ing on the war in Ukraine, human rights, polit­i­cal pris­on­ers, and Belarus’s demo­c­ra­t­ic future. Access from Belarus remains pos­si­ble through a new mir­ror, linked under every arti­cle.