Russian old style press control.

The poster below says “Let’s raise the generation utterly devoted to the cause of communism!” in dates back to 1947, just after the Second World War. It is propaganda and the doctrine of the old USSR that influences the thinking of the Russian leadership today, and in particular one Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin a former member of the KGB, and currently president of Russia.

He believes in the greatness of the old motherland the USSR and appears to want a return to the past and the modern Russian empire that was Eastern Europe to be under his control again. The problem is that the majority of the people in the old USSR that where given their freedom from the control of Moscow after the end of Communism don't want to return to the fold, and those that do are generally Russian citizens that stayed in these states after the break up. You can see this in the current situation in the Ukraine and how the people near the Russian boarder are seeking to closer ties with Moscow and are being backup in their campaign by arms from Russia.

The current situation in the Ukraine has brought a lot of negative comment and reporting from around the world, especially from those countries of the former Western powers and the former, now free states of the USSR. Increasing political pressure has been applied to Vladimir Putin and his government in order to stop his ambitions in creating a greater Russia by taking back lands populated by majority Russian populations as was done in Crimea recently. This was an invasion done by stealth and it was done with militarily precision, it was clear that a lot of planning had secretly gone before the event and arms supplied the Russian supporters in the region.

Back in the former old USSR, during the cold war the press was highly regulated and exclusively controlled by the Communist state, people in the media talking out would have ended up being arrested and interrogated by the KGB before being sent to a political reeducation work camp and left to rot. When the Communist state fell there was an explosion of free press in Russia and all looked good for press freedom for a while. In recent years successive Russian Governments have been able to put more and more pressure on this free press some of which was accomplished by the introduction of a law to combat terrorism and extremist activity, this effectively limited the power of the press with undefined definition of what is or what is not covered by the law. This has effectively silenced the press once more and making it a mouthpiece of the Russian Government and this has also been used to prevent foreign journalists entering the country.   

Currently in terms of free press the Russian nation lies 176th out of 197 counties. It has been reported that "the directors of the television channels and the newspapers are invited every Thursday into the Kremlin office of the deputy head of administration, Vladislav Surkov to learn what news should be presented, and where." This is clear state manipulation of the press and it all started shortly after Vladimir Putin was made president for the first time back in 2002.  It is a return to the old days in the USSR when the country was run by the Communist Party.

As recently as 2012 the Russian Government passed legislation that created a blacklist of Internet sites and made the providers of telecom services liable for such breaches of the law. Under this law it is possible, because its wording, to allow authorities to mass block Internet resources with legal that don't meet with the Russian Governments approval. It is backed up with jail sentences for beaches of the law for as long as 5 years in prison.

Slowly the erosion of freedom of the press and the Internet in Russia goes on and on. Today Russia introduced laws that means that every Russian blogger draws more than 3,000 daily readers to register with the Russian government and submit to the same regulations as mass media. This law has been dubbed as “blogger law” and its effect is to put large swaths of Russia’s prominent online personalities in theoretical violation of the law at all times, risking fines and other harassment whenever authorities decide to crack down on opposition to the Governments view.

This new law is wrong, and the Russian people need to start pushing to repel this law and the others put in place since Vladimir Putin and his supporters came to power in 2002 before it is too late for the press and members of public to oppose the views of the state. If that doesn't happen it will be  a return to the days secret police and the KGB the oppression of a great people by its own Government.