Law enforcement authorities in Moscow announced on Tuesday that they have pressed fresh criminal charges against YouTube blogger and exiled activist Maxim Katz over alleged repeated violations of Russia’s “foreign agent” law.
The Moscow branch of Russia’s Investigative Committee, which probes major crimes, said it was considering whether to issue an arrest warrant for Katz, who has lived in Israel since 2022.
Russia’s Justice Ministry designated Katz a “foreign agent” in July 2022, a label that carries extensive restrictions and mandatory disclaimers on published content.
Katz, who has nearly 2.5 million YouTube subscribers, was the first individual with the designation to be fined for distributing online material without the required disclaimer. Repeated violations of the law are punishable by up to two years in prison.
In 2023, a Moscow court sentenced Katz in absentia to eight years in prison for spreading “fake news” about the Russian military. Prosecutors accused him of falsely claiming in an April 2022 YouTube video that Russian forces had executed civilians in the Kyiv suburb of Bucha.
On Tuesday, the state-run RIA Novosti news agency, citing anonymous law enforcement sources, reported that a member of the exiled anti-war group Deputies of Peaceful Russia allegedly alerted authorities to Katz’s “foreign agent” violations. The tip reportedly followed an internal dispute over Katz’s proposal to keep members’ identities confidential unless they chose to go public.
The Moscow Times was unable to independently verify that report.
Russia designated Deputies of Peaceful Russia an “undesirable organization” in August 2024, accusing its founders of receiving funding from Western intelligence services.
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