The signatory associations consider that this presence is indecent and that Ms Fedorova should be declared persona non grata by the Festival organisers and their institutional and media supporters.

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Mrs Fedorova presents herself as a martyr for freedom of expression, but

- Xenia Fedorova is a disciple of Margarita Simonyan, one of Putin's main propagandists, who has no hesitation in asserting that her ideal for the organisation of the media is the Chinese model of centralised information.

​- Fedorova worked for various media outlets in the Ano-TV Novosti group, which was sanctioned by the European Union on 15 December 2022 for its support for Russia's military aggression against Ukraine.

-  Xenia Fedorova was President of RT France, a channel sanctioned by the European Union on 1st March 2022 for its support of Russia's military aggression against Ukraine.

- Xenia Fedorova, in her book Bannie and her recent media appearances, continues to defend the Kremlin's position and to use the terminology "special military operation" to describe the invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022. All his narratives on Maïdan, the annexation of Crimea and the origins of the war are those of Russian war propaganda.

-  Xenia Fedorova has brought a number of legal actions against associations and experts who denounced RT France as a media outlet influenced by the Kremlin. Her accusations of defamation have been systematically dismissed.

-  Xenia Fedorova is lying. Contrary to what she claims, the sanctions imposed by the European Union have a legal basis. The legal bases were confirmed by the European Court of First Instance on 27 July 2022, which recognised that these sanctions corresponded to objectives of general interest and dismissed RT France's case.​

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Bannie [Banned]  is first and foremost a huge lie of omission, glossing over the atrocities of Russian

aggression:

• the deaths of Ukrainian civilians (more than 12,654 according to the Secretariat of the High Commissioner for Refugees, as of 21 February 2025), including writers (Maksym Kryslov, Victoria Amelina, Volodymyr Vakoulenko, etc.) who will not be able to come tonthe Paris Book Festival;

• the countless cases of rape and torture committed by the Russian Army against civilians and prisoners,

• the deportation and Russification of 19,500 Ukrainian children;

• the arbitrary detention of thousands of Ukrainian civilians, often accompanied by torture;

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The so-called defender of freedom of expression is also silent:

• atrocities committed by the Russian army against journalists in Ukraine: 13 journalists killed since 2022, 47 journalists injured, 1 journalist missing (source: RSF);

• the repression of all forms of freedom expression and opposition in Russia:

  • the assassination opponents (Boris Nemstov, Alexei Navalny) and journalists (Paul Klebnikov, Anna Politkovskaya, Pavel Cheremet, Natalia Estemirova, Anastassia Babourova, Stanislas Markelov, and last September the Ukrainian journalist Victoria Roshchyna...);

  • 44 journalists currently detained (source: RSF);

  • the many convictions of citizens opposed to the war (most recently the historian Alexander Skobov);

  • the blocking in Russia of 81 Western media without any explicit legal basis;

  • the numerous convictions of individuals and legal entities, designated as  "foreign agents" or "undesirables" simply for opposing the war;

  • greater control over the Internet

• The detention of 18 Ukrainian journalists in Russia;

• the destruction of television infrastructures in Ukraine (23 strikes since 2022) and the takeover of all transmitters in illegally annexed territories

• jamming of Western satellite services (television, GSM, etc.)

• disinformation operations by troll factories and propaganda agencies

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Xenia Fedorova's book and media appearances support the imperialist and genocidal aggression against Ukraine. They are not journalism but war propaganda. There is no symmetry between European sanctions and censorship by the Russian authorities: Russia censors opposition to the war, while Europe sanctions the Russian media because they support the aggression of a sovereign state and jeopardise the public order and security of the European Union.

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"Any propaganda in favour of war is prohibited by law", Article 1G of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (UN, 16 December 1966).