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Eutelsat pulls RT DE off air after being contacted by German media authorities

The channel said it regarded the move as illegal and said it was confident a court would overturn the decision

BERLIN, December 22. /TASS/. Eutelsat, a European satellite operator, took off the air the German-language television channel RT DE on Wednesday after being contacted by a German media commissioner, said Anneke Plass, a spokeswoman for the MABB media authority in Berlin and the surrounding state of Brandenburg.

Tobias Schmid, a Commissioner for European Affairs of the German Media Authorities, reached out to Eutelsat to brief the company on the state of affairs regarding the channel, including that Luxembourg denied a broadcasting license to TV-Novosti in summer, Plass told TASS. The commissioner acted in close cooperation with MABB, she said.

Luxembourg declined to issue a license, saying most of the channel’s staff were based in Berlin and referred the broadcaster to Germany.

RT reported that MABB earlier forced the satellite operator Eutelsat 9В to pull the new German-language channel RT DE that broadcast from Moscow. The channel said it regarded the move as illegal and said it was confident a court would overturn the decision.