Ukraine blocks access to Russian websites Yandex, VK, and Odnoklassniki

Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko signed a decree introducing new sanctions against Russia on Tuesday. Amongst other restrictions, the decree blocks access to Russian social networking sites VK (VKontakte) and Odnoklassniki. Access will also be blocked to all of the services of search engine Yandex. The text of the decree has been published on the official website of Ukraine’s head of state.

Access to the Mail.ru group websites will also be blocked, as well as those of the Kaspersky anti-virus company and DrWeb.

Economic sanctions, including the freezing of assets and a ban on transactions and broadcasting, were also introduced against the largest Russian television networks and media outlets, namely TV Tsentr, RBK, VGTRK, NTV Plus, Zvezda, TNT, REN, and OTR.

Yandex, VK, and Odnoklassniki are the leading websites of the Ukrainian-language segment of Internet. Ukraine is VK’s second largest market after Russia.