Natasha Sindeeva (Russia)

Founder & CEO, Dozhd

Journalist Natasha, as well as being the founder, main owner, and CEO of Dozhd, was the cofounder and former general producer of the Silver Rain radio station, is a three-time laureate of the Media Manager of Russia prize, and is an honorary academician of the Russian Academy of Radio. Following her classification as a foreign agent by the Russian government in 2021, Natasha responded with an open letter, in which she wrote, “[Dozhd] is almost 200 people who, just like me, love their country, cheer for it and want Russia to become better – more humane, safer, fairer, more honest, richer, freer. […] You can joke as much as you like about the status of ‘foreign agent’ and call it a ‘seal of excellence’. But, in fact, all this is terrible. It is quite awful when the state divides people into ‘friends’ and ‘strangers’.”