RT, formerly Russia Today (), is a Russian state-controlled international news television network funded by the Russian government. It operates pay television and free-to-air channels directed to audiences outside of Russia, as well as providing Internet content in Russian, English, Spanish, French, German, Arabic, Portuguese and Serbian.
RT is a brand of TV-Novosti, a nonprofit registered as an "autonomous non-commercial organization" (ANO) and founded by the Russian state news agency FSUE RIA Novosti in April 2005. During the economic crisis in December 2008, the Russian government, headed by Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, included ANO "TV-Novosti" on its list of core organizations of strategic importance to Russia. RT operates as a multilingual service with channels in five languages: the original English-language channel was launched in 2005, the Arabic-language channel in 2007, Spanish in 2009, German in 2014 and French in 2017. RT America (2010–2022), RT UK (2014–2022) and other regional channels also produce local content. RT is the parent company of the Ruptly video agency, which owns the Redfish video channel and the Maffick digital media company.
RT has regularly been described as a major propaganda outlet for the Russian government and its foreign policy. Academics, fact-checkers, and news reporters (including some current and former RT reporters) have identified RT as a purveyor of disinformation and conspiracy theories. UK media regulator Ofcom has repeatedly found RT to have breached its rules on impartiality, including multiple instances in which RT broadcast "materially misleading" content.
In 2012, RT's editor-in-chief Margarita Simonyan compared the channel to the Russian Ministry of Defence. Referring to the Russo-Georgian War, she stated that it was "waging an information war, and with the entire Western world". In September 2017, RT America was ordered to register as a foreign agent with the United States Department of Justice under the Foreign Agents Registration Act.
RT was banned in Ukraine in 2014 after Russia's annexation of Crimea; Latvia and Lithuania implemented similar bans in 2020. Germany banned RT DE in February 2022. During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the European Union and Canada formally banned RT and independent service providers in over 10 countries suspended broadcasts of RT. Social media websites followed by blocking external links to RT's website and restricting access to RT's content. Microsoft removed RT from their app store and de-ranked their search results on Bing, while Apple removed the RT app from all countries except for Russia. However, RT content continues to be laundered through third-party sites.
History
Foundation
RT's formation was part of a public relations effort by the Russian Government in 2005 to improve Russia's image abroad. RT was conceived by former media minister Mikhail LesinAndrew Osborn, Russia's 'CNN' wants to tell it like it is , The Age, 16 August 2005. and Aleksei Gromov. At the time of RT's founding, RIA Novosti director Svetlana Mironyuk stated: "Unfortunately, at the level of mass consciousness in the West, Russia is associated with three words: communism, snow and poverty", and added "we would like to present a more complete picture of life in our country". RT is funded by the Federal Agency for Press and Mass Media, part of the government of Russia.
In 2005, RIA Novosti founded ANO TV-Novosti (or "Autonomous Non-profit Organization TV-News") to serve as the parent organization for RT. ANO TV-Novosti was registered on 6 April 2005, and Sergey Frolov () was appointed its CEO.
The channel was launched as Russia Today on 10 December 2005. At its launch, the channel employed 300 journalists, including approximately 70 from outside Russia.Julian Evans, Spinning Russia , Foreign Policy, 1 December 2005. Russia Today appointed Margarita Simonyan as its editor-in-chief; she recruited foreign journalists as presenters and consultants.
Simonyan, aged 25 years old when she was appointed, was a former Kremlin pool reporter who had worked in journalism since she was 18. She told The New York Times that after the fall of the Soviet Union, many new young journalists were hired, resulting in a much younger pool of staffers than other news organizations.Stephen Heyman, A Voice of Mother Russia, in English , The New York Times, 18 May 2008. Journalist Danny Schechter (who has appeared as a guest on RT)Danny Schechter interview on RT website. (via YouTube) stated that, having been part of the launch staff at CNN, he saw RT as another "channel of young people who are inexperienced, but very enthusiastic about what they are doing".Shaun Walker, Russia Today, Tomorrow the World , The Independent, 20 September 2010. Shortly after the channel was launched, James Painter wrote that RT and similar news channels such as France 24 and TeleSUR saw themselves as "counter-hegemonic", offering a differing vision and news content from that of Western media like CNN and the BBC.
Development and expansion
RT launched several new channels in ensuing years: the Arabic language channel Rusiya Al-Yaum in 2007, the Spanish language channel Actualidad RT in 2009, RT America – which focuses on the United States – in 2010, and the RT Documentary channel in 2011.
In August 2007, Russia Today became the first television channel to report live from the North Pole (with the report lasting five minutes and 41 seconds). An RT crew participated in the Arktika 2007 Russian polar expedition, led by Artur Chilingarov on the Akademik Fyodorov icebreaker. On 31 December 2007, RT's broadcasts of New Year's Eve celebrations in Moscow and Saint Petersburg were broadcast in the hours prior to the New Year's Eve event at New York City's Times Square.
Russia Today drew particular attention worldwide for its coverage of the 2008 South Ossetia war.David Weigel, Pravda Will Set You Free; Russia's answer to Fox News and MSNBC. , Slate, 27 June 2011. RT named Georgia as the aggressor against the separatist governments of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, which were protected by Russian troops.Charles King, Clarity in the Caucasus? , Foreign Affairs, 11 October 2009. RT saw this as the incident that showcased its newsgathering abilities to the world. Margarita Simonyan stated: "we were the only ones among the English-language media who were giving the other side of the story – the South Ossetian side of the story".
In 2009, Russia Today was rebranded to "RT", which George Washington University academics Jack Nassetta and Kimberly Gross described as an "[attempt] to shed state affiliation". Simonyan said the company had not changed names but the company's corporate logo was changed to attract more viewers: "who is interested in watching news from Russia all day long?" Julia Ioffe also describes 2009, when the Barack Obama administration came to office "promising a different approach toward Russia", as a time when RT became "more international and less anti-American", and "built a state-of-the-art studio and newsroom" in the U.S. capital
In early 2010, RT unveiled an advertising campaign to promote its new "Question More" slogan. The campaign was created by Ketchum, GPlus, and London's Portland PR. One of the advertisements featured as part of the campaign showed U.S. President Barack Obama morphing into Iranian leader Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and asked: "Who poses the greatest nuclear threat?" The ad was banned in American airports. Another showed a Western soldier "merging" with a Taliban fighter and asked: "Is terror only inflicted by terrorists?"Ian Burrell, From Russia with news , The Independent, 15 January 2010. One of RT's 2010 billboard advertisements won the British Awards for National Newspaper Advertising "Ad of the Month".RT's Advertising Declared Ad of the Month in UK , RT (TV network), 5 March 2010.
In 2010, Walter Isaacson, Chairman of the U.S. Government's Broadcasting Board of Governors, which runs Voice of America, Radio Free Europe and Radio Free Asia, called for more money to invest in the programs because "We can't allow ourselves to be out-communicated by our enemies", specifically mentioning Russia Today, Iran's Press TV and China's China Central Television (CCTV) in the following sentence. He later explained that he actually was referring to "enemies" in Afghanistan, not the countries he mentioned.Josh Rogin, New BBG chief wants more money to combat "enemies" such as China and Russia , Foreign Policy, 5 October 2010. In 2011, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton stated that the U.S. was "losing the information war" abroad to foreign channels like RT, Al Jazeera and China Central Television and that they were supplanting the Voice of America.Andy McSmith, Village People, The Independent, 5 March 2011Ishaan Tharoor, Clinton Applauds Al Jazeera, Rolls Eyes at U.S. Media, Time, 3 March 2011.
2012–2021 In early 2012, shortly after his appointment as U.S. Ambassador to Russia, Michael McFaul challenged Margarita Simonyan on Twitter about allegations from RT that he had sent Russian opposition figure Alexei Navalny to study at Yale University. According to RT, McFaul was referring to a comment in an article by political scientist Igor Panarin, which RT had specified were the views of the author.New US Ambassador to Russia starts with lies , Pravda, 2 February 2012. McFaul then accepted an interview by Sophie Shevardnadze on RT on this and other issues and reasserted that the Obama administration wanted a "reset" in relations with Russia.'US not funding Putin's presidential campaign' , RT interview with Ambassador Michael McFaul.
On 17 April 2012, RT debuted World Tomorrow, a news interview programme hosted by WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. The first guest on the program was Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah.Alessandra Stanley, The Prisoner as Talk Show Host; Julian Assange Starts Talk Show on Russian TV , The New York Times, 17 April 2012. The interview made global headlines as Nasrallah rarely gives interviews to Western media. Commentators described this as a "coup".Raphael Satter, Assange interviews Hezbollah leader in TV premiere , Associated Press via Denver Post, 17 April 2012.Assange chats with terrorist , Agence France-Presse, 18 April 2012. WikiLeaks described the show as "a series of in-depth conversations with key political players, thinkers and revolutionaries from around the world". It stated that the show is "independently produced and Assange has control"; WikiLeaks offers a "Broadcasters license, only".Douglas Lucas, Julian Assange prepares his next move , Salon, 23 February 2012.
Assange said that RT allowed his guests to discuss things that they "could not say on a mainstream TV network". Assange's production company made the show and Assange had full editorial control. Assange said that, if WikiLeaks had published large amounts of compromising data on Russia, his relationship with RT might not have been so comfortable. In August of that year, RT suffered a denial of service attack. Some people linked the attack to RT's connection with Assange, and others to an impending court verdict related to Pussy Riot.David Meyer, Russia Today hit by DDoS as anti-Wikileaks group claims responsibility, ZDNet, 17 August 2012.