— We cover life in Krasnodar and Krasnodar Krai. Our publication is neither pro-opposition nor pro-state, we write, remaining true to facts, about what is happening in the region and how it affects people’s lives. The media has existed for a long time, and by regional standards it has quite a large audience. Among their readers are the [Krasnodar] administration and representatives of various departments.

Yuga.ru has always followed an advertisement-based model which has probably transformed in a way over time with the development of the internet and new formats, more and more companies have been coming there, and social networks emerged. We have no investors, no sponsors, and no source of income other than advertising.

Over almost 21 years of work, we have gone through different periods. There were times when we paid salaries late. In 2019 and early 2020, we thought we were growing stronger, getting on our feet, but then the pandemic struck. Large clients with whom we had already signed contracts put our cooperation on hold and the prospects were uncertain. No new clients were coming our way. Later, things started picking up, getting reasonably normal. In 2021, everything became fine. We have been in this market for quite a while and know how to write; our clients know us. Marketers, PR people who move from one company to another come back to us.

In the course of our work, we have repeatedly faced pressure. This has taken the form of increased interest in what we publish, especially when it concerns the activity of the opposition. With online reports from rallies, we would receive calls, asking us to remove the publications. Most of the time, we fought back by saying that we were simply doing our job, that no one was trying to stir things up with these articles.

We also noticed an increased interest in us after we joined Syndicate (Syndicate 100, an association of independent Russian media established in February 2020 — note by the project team). The founder and I were asked questions: what are you doing in Syndicate? Does Novaya Gazeta pay you? (Novaya Gazeta is part of Syndicate 100 — note by the project team) Have you been paid for this article? I found the questions absolutely absurd, but from the point of view of the ministry, they must have been logical. I replied that no one pays us or orders what to write.

Last year there was an incident, after which two members of the editorial staff were called in for questioning. We removed the publication in question from the website because we realized that anything could happen otherwise. The article mentioned, without much detail, a high-ranking official from Krasnodar Krai.

— On February 24, we were filled with horror and despair. We were out of the office, but in touch with each other. Someone was at work from 6−7 in the morning, writing about what was going on. It was very scary, we didn’t understand not only what was happening but also what to write. Terrified, we were scrolling through our feeds, not knowing if we were being told the truth or not.

I remember I was on public transport and I saw the "Z" stickers on billboards and on the tram windows and I cried — and I saw another woman who was crying as well. I think it’s hard to be productive and do something good and right when you’re in despair. So, we did an article with a psychologist on how to cope with constant stress, we were watching Ekaterina Shulmann’s [well-known Russian political scientist labelled as "foreign agent"] broadcasts trying to figure out for ourselves how to live on.

Since we are not a news agency and have no source of information on the ground, we cannot report anything of value and importance to change the narrative. We have realized that it does not make sense for us to fill our entire agenda with this. People need to get on with their lives and find out where the roads, schools and clinics will be built, that there is something on in the cinemas despite the cancellations, what exhibitions are going on. They might gain some mental strength there.

With new laws coming out, everything became clear. My colleagues and I combed through all our publications, by twos or threes, doublechecking, to see what was mentioned there and what words were used. We realized that we simply could not write something that was not confirmed by official sources, and that we did not want to publish what was confirmed as it might turn out to be false.

Our policy is to write about what is happening in our area. Special operation is not happening on our territory and we know nothing about it. Airports in our region have been closed and we have collected stories of people stranded abroad and those who have arrived at the airport and not gone anywhere. In one of the first days of the special operation there were rumors about explosions in Yeysk. No one confirmed these rumors, but we published the story anyway because it scared us. We published stories of people who had left. One of our employees left too, we supported her. The others stayed in Krasnodar. None of us are going to leave unless there is an immediate threat to life and freedom.

— In April, we had to remove a publication that was linked to Kuban State University. As in many higher education institutions in Russia, when the names of students were found in anti-war petitions, they were put through educational talks. One such petition was signed by our staff journalist, a university student. She was asked to write an explanatory letter. She prepared a story about this, and we showed it to a lawyer. When the text came out, we were asked to remove it. From last year’s experience we understood that more serious consequences might follow, therefore we decided that it would be better to take down the article.

We register an increased interest not only in our publications on the military activities. In the spring there was a noticeable surge of attention to our older articles and especially those by Iolina Gribkova, who writes about charity and non-neurotypical people. She wrote an article about a transgender guy, a well-known Krasnodar athlete who is in a same-sex couple and they have a child. Iolina received a Pussy Riot award for one of her stories. We saw that her material began to be searched [on the media’s website] by her name, this was disturbing.

Before releasing a special operation-related text, we discuss it at length. Together we have come to the conclusion that we will do more if we remain operational. Nothing good will come of being blocked. We cannot afford the fine, we have no money for that. Of course, special operation is the most global and tragic topic right now, but we can’t say anything of such value about it that would justify us being shut down.

In mid-May we had two articles published on the same day. One was about Alipat [Sultanbegova], an activist (she was arrested twice: for helping detainees at a rally, it was believed that she had organized it, and for her tweet about police officers — note by the project team) and the activist of the Silver Volunteering Centre in the Krasnodar Krai (the organization develops volunteering among people aged 55 and over — note by the project team) who supports the current politics. This way we wanted to show that we cover different views.

After those texts, we haven’t published anything [related to the hostilities]. That was partly accidental and partly intentional: we try to avoid special operation’s becoming the main topic of the media; generally, we do not publish much. If there are two editorial texts planned for the week, we choose other topics, such as tourism. On top of that we have commercial publications. We don’t want to give up covering life in general, otherwise the feed would look as follows: an article about refugees, a partner text, one about volunteers. It is one-sided and not what we want.

But we also work for people engaged in charity work, for teachers and train drivers threatened to be sacked for their position, for residents of uncompleted and long-delayed construction projects or an area with rivers instead of roads. Their lives matter too.

— The situation with advertisers today is not critical. Right now, their number is stable. There were periods in February and April when regular clients said they wanted to stop and wait for a while and new ones where not coming. Now again, [like during the pandemic], we cannot plan in the long term. We manage to pay salaries on time, which is cool.

Our strategy is to do everything we can to prevent blocking and being designated as a foreign agent. But we don’t know if they can use some of our old publications as a formal reason to block us. Especially when it comes to what we published in the noughties, when media norms and attitudes were different.

If they declare us a foreign agent, we will lose advertisers. If we are blocked, we will lose everything: both traffic and advertisers. We will not be able to raise enough money to remain afloat, we are not a very large regional media. We have a considerable audience, but these people have other sources of information as well: social media, as well as pro-government and federal media. We will be forced to close down and disperse. The prospect looks bleak.