Moldovan journalist banned from entering Russia again

For the second time the Russian authorities forbade the Moldovan-born journalist of the Russian publication The New Times, Natalia Morari, from entering Russia, Info-Prim Neo reports, quoting the Russian media. According to the Moscow press, on February 27, the journalist was stopped at the Domodedovo Airport and informed that she was not allowed to enter Russia though she was married to a Russian citizen. The Russian border guards tried to get Morari boarded on a plane to Chisinau that was to take off an hour later, but she refused. Afterwards, Morari was taken to a lounge for those that are to be deported from Russia. The Russian news agency Ria-Novosti quoted a police source as saying Morari was included in the list of persons that are banned access to Russia. Natalia Morari was detained on the night of December 16, 2007 at Moscow’s Domodedovo Airport. She was returning from a trip to Israel. Officers of the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) informed her she was banned from entering Russia. According to the journalist and to the editorial office she works for, such a decision was made after she had published information critical of the Kremlin. Later, in an answer to an official request to the Russian Embassy in Chisinau, she was notified that she was forbidden from entering Russia under an article of the law on the entry into and exit out of Russia, which says that “the entry of a foreign citizen into Russia is banned, if this action is needed in order to ensure the defence or security of the state or to ensure public order and to protect the population’s health.” Natalia Morari was born in Hancesti. She graduated from the Chisinau high school Gaudeamus. She studied at the State University in Moscow and has worked for The New Times for almost a year.