Russia-Ukraine war: Netflix announces to halt all future projects & acquisitions in Russia

Amid ongoing Russia’s invasion into Ukraine, US-based streaming giant Netflix announced that it has suspended all future projects and acquisitions from Russia. The multinational company said that it was also assessing the impact of the current invasion of Ukraine. According to a BBC report, the filming of the Russian language series ‘Zato’ will also be suspended. This comes days after Netflix had said that it had “no plans” of carrying Russian state channels on its platform.

Netflix is the latest entertainment platform to take a stance against Russia’s onslaught in Ukraine. Earlier, Disney, Sony and Warner Bros suspended the release of their films in Russia due to its invasion of Ukraine. Another tech giant, Oracle also said that it is suspending all operations in Russia as Russian troops are accused of attacking residential areas. 

On Tuesday, Apple had also declared that it was halting sales in Russia. It is to note that Oracle’s announcement on Twitter came three hours after the Ukrainian Minister of Digital Transformation tweeted the company, calling for support. In reply to the Ukrainian Minister's tweet, Oracle said “On behalf of Oracle’s 150,000 employees around the world and in support of both the elected government of Ukraine and for the people of Ukraine, Oracle Corporation has already suspended all operations in the Russian Federation.”

Global brands rally support for Ukraine

In eight days of Russia launching a full-scale war into Ukraine, global brands including  Shell, Nike, H&M and Boeing have cut ties or temporarily suspended sales in Russia. With brands rallying support for Ukraine, Moscow has responded to the foreign company’s measures by temporarily restricting Russian asset sales by foreigners. According to Kremin, on Wednesday, Russian President Vladimir Putin met with the president of the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs to discuss how it would attempt to minimise the impact of sanctions announced so far. Apart from brans, social media giants such as Meta platforms and Google have also ramped up restrictions against Russia.

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