"It is not true!" Zakharova did not notice the campaign against foreign media agents in Russia

"We will do our best to disavow this information when they say that foreign media outlets in our country do not enjoy the same rights as other media outlets. This is not true... We continue to work with everybody", - RIA Novosti quoted the words of Zakharova.

The spokesman for the foreign ministry also said that the BBC journalists initially submitted an application, but immediately withdrew their participation in the working breakfast.

"An interesting point is about who limits whom and how: we organize this breakfast, everything is open, please get accreditation, invitations and so on. The BBC calls us: "We would like to participate". We say, "Of course, please". And provided them a seat", - said Zakharova.

According to her, on the eve of the event, an Air Force officer called and clarified whether the publication was really taking part in this event.

"The BBC calls back, the person who initially announced, saying that his poor knowledge of the language did not allow him to understand the format of the event and he was forced to withdraw his participation in the event... Just do not then give out such stories that someone was not allowed in", - said representative of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation.

It should be noted that when Zakharova was asked about the closure of the business publication VTimes *, recognized as a foreign agent, she replied that she was “not aware” of this situation, and “no one closed VTimes *”.

At the same time, the publication itself said that his inclusion in the list of foreign agents practically did not leave the management of choice:

- The "foreign agent" status deprives VTimes * of most of our media agenda: many officials, businessmen and even analysts are afraid to comment on the "foreign agent" - and we also understand why

- with or without the status of a foreign agent. In each of the scenarios there was a risk of criminal prosecution of the newspaper's employees with the possibility of imprisonment.

Note that the State Duma intends to prohibit media-foreign agents from conducting opinion polls before the elections. Earlier, Stanislav Kozlovsky, director of the non-profit partnership Wikimedia RU (runs the Russian version of Wikipedia), expressed concern that Wikipedia would be recognized as a foreign agent in Russia.

Earlier it was reported that during a working breakfast with Zakharova, the participants had to consider issues of legislation regarding the media recognized by foreign agents. The representatives of the publications were promised to explain how the new procedure for their work in the country would be implemented.

* The publication is included by the Ministry of Justice in the register of media - foreign agents.