MOSCOW (Sputnik) — RT's Editor-in-Chief Margarita Simonyan said that the international broadcaster's accounts had been blocked in the United Kingdom. RT UK said it had been informed by NatWest, a large state-owned retailer, that its banking arrangements with RT were null and void.
"Certainly, it was an extraordinary proposition. If, for example, the BBC were using Russian banking and a state-owned bank were to close its banking facilities, then politicians in this country rightly would be jumping up on that as a restriction of freedom of speech. And if indeed it turns out that a state-owned bank like the NatWest is actually going to close the banking facilities of RT, then that would be the sort of thing that happens in a tin pot dictatorship, not in a liberal democracy," Salmond told RT in an interview.
Salmond also expressed hope that those UK lawmakers who believe in freedom of speech would speak out against the NatWest move "as we would speak out if the BBC were being sanctioned elsewhere."
RT operates a number of cable and satellite television channels in a number of languages and is directed at a foreign audience. The channels provide 24-hour news coverage, as well as airing documentaries, talk shows and debates.
