About the detention of a citizen of Latvia, who works for "Russia Today", the publication Delfi reports with reference to the Latvian State Security Service.

As reported by the editors, the journalist was detained on January 3.

He has Latvian citizenship, arrived in the country at the end of December.

Delfi does not give the name of the detainee.

Kasem was arrested on January 5 and transferred to Riga Central Prison.

According to the agency, their employee, in addition to being accused of violating sanctions, could be charged with espionage.

Other sources do not confirm this information.

In March 2022, after the large-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine, the European Union banned the work of the Sputnik agency and the RT channel on the territory of the EU countries.

The ban was introduced until the end of the war and until Russia and its associated media "stop disinformation and information manipulation against the EU."

Even before the introduction of the ban at the EU level, Latvia banned the publication of the holding company "Russia Today", which includes Sputnik, on its territory.

There they explained it as personal sanctions of the EC against the general director of the holding

Dmitriy Kisialev

.

Russia calls the actions of the EU and Latvia an attack on freedom of speech.

After the invasion of Ukraine, Moscow banned the work of dozens of Western and Russian mass media on its territory, accusing them of spreading disinformation, and passed a law on the extrajudicial closure of newsrooms.