Russian authorities briefly detained and then deported the chief of the board that oversees US government broadcasting overseas, including the Voice of America and Radio Free Europe, the agency said Wednesday, the latest move amid heightening friction between Washington and Moscow.
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He said he refused to sign the document, and that a translation was provided to him and also he refused to sign that. Chairman of the US Broadcasting Board of Governors, Jeff Shell who was denied entry into Russia upon arrival at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo airport on July 12, has been placed on the Russian stop list of individuals denied entry into Russia for his role in steering anti-Russian propaganda, the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a comment on Wednesday.
Shell told colleagues that the denial of entry into Russian Federation has permanent status and carries “a life-time ban”, according to BBG.
Shell’s detention and expulsion appears to be related to his position as BBG chairman.
Shell said authorities showed him a document in Russian and demanded that he sign it but he refused, according to an interview he gave to the New York Times. “Shell is the chairman of the US Broadcasting Board of Governors”, the ministry said in a statement.
BBG officials said they had met with USA ambassador John Tefft in Moscow and that he and the State Department were looking into it.
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Shell was “detained in a locked room for several hours, before being accompanied by Russian security officials to board a flight to Amsterdam”, the organization wrote, noting that Shell is a presidential appointee. Last year, US films dominated ticket sales even more than in recent years as box-office revenue hit a new record in local-currency terms.
