Russian censorship agency Roskomnadzor has blocked access to two publications on an international website for chess aficionados chess.com, Russia’s digital rights watchdog Roskomsvoboda noted.
The censorship agency blocked access to two publications about the war in Ukraine. The content was blocked through HTTPS, which means that access to the entire website is now denied, Roskomsvoboda said. According to GlobalCheck monitoring service, the accessibility of chess.com in Russia is at 0%.
On February 27, three days after the start of Russia’s “special operation,” chess.com published a statement in support of Ukraine. “Geopolitics are often compared to chess, but the aggression of the Russian government, which ignores international law and the sovereignty of a democratic nation, has nothing to do with our beloved board game,” the statement reads.
The statement also quoted anti-war tweets by famous chess players, including Russian grandmasters Yan Nepomniachtchi and Peter Svidler.
“History has seen many Black Thursdays. But today is blacker than the others.#нетвойне#saynotowar”, Nepomniachtchi wrote.
Earlier in April, another Russian chess player Sergey Karjakin condemned the policy of chess.com in a statement published on his Telegram channel. “After their aggressive policy and “removal” of the Russian flag, I can’t pretend that everything is fine anymore. I have decided not to play on this platform until they issue an official apology (that is, never),” he said.
On April 15, Russia’s censorship agency blocked access to The Moscow Times online newspaper. Since the start of the war in Ukraine, Russia has blocked access to over 600,000 websites.
