Russia's RT will continue to work in the West, editor says

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russian state media outlet RT, which the United States has accused of trying to influence its presidential election, will continue to work in the West by going around any limits or sanctions, its editor-in-chief said on Sunday.

The United States on Wednesday filed money-laundering charges against two employees of RT for what officials said was a scheme to hire an American company to produce online content to influence the 2024 election.

The United States also announced actions targeting RT, including Editor-in-Chief Margarita Simonyan, calling her "a central figure in Russian government malign influence efforts".

Simonyan said on RT that the West had been cracking down on the network since 2014, when Russia unilaterally annexed Crimea, and more strongly since the start of 2022 - when Russia launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine - and trying to prevent RT operating as a "normal journalist organisation".

"We stayed in those countries, we worked there, and we shall work there - just not now in a straight line," Simonyan said. "We will continue to do that as far as we can - so far it is working out - it's almost like an exquisite gambling thrill." 

"They close entry to us, and we will go through the window, close the window and we will go through the vents and we will see what holes there are in the organism of the United States of America."

US SAYS RT TRYING TO INFLUENCE US ELECTION

A senior U.S. intelligence official said RT was using American and other personalities to try to sway U.S. voters into backing Republican presidential nominee and former president Donald Trump over his Democratic rival, Vice President Kamala Harris.

Russia has since 2022 suppressed almost all remaining independent domestic media, mostly for deviating from the government line on the war in Ukraine, and banned numerous staff at Western news organisations.

It has pledged to retaliate against U.S. media for the actions against RT, expanding a growing list of restrictions in both Russia and the West on news outlets from the other side accused of spreading falsehoods.

In June, Russia said it was shutting out the broadcasts of 81 media outlets from the European Union in retaliation for a similar EU ban on several Russian media outlets.

Simonyan said all U.S. media should be kicked out of Russia and that major U.S.-based social media networks - such as Alphabet's YouTube and Meta's Instagram - should be replaced in Russia because of their influence there.

"We need to make a final, serious leap so that our sites are fully competitive and better, so that they can replace those ones and so that we throw them out of here," she said.

Simonyan said letting such platforms continue to operate inside Russia was like "settling a serious enemy army unit here in barracks and taking young people on excursions there, day and night".

Instagram is banned in Russia but can still be accessed using VPN software. YouTube, the most popular foreign video platform in Russia, remains available, though access was noticeably much slower last month. 

Neither Alphabet nor Meta responded to a request for comment.

(Writing by Guy Faulconbridge; Editing by Kevin Liffey)