Netflix has put on hold all future projects and acquisitions from Russia amid its invasion of Ukraine.
According to Variety, the streaming service had four Russian originals in the pipeline, including a crime thriller series directed by Dasha Zhuk, which was shooting and has been postponed.
The 1990’s set series was Netflix’s second original series filming in Russia, following ‘Anna K’which wrapped last year, PTI reported from Los Angeles, quoting Variety.
A source close to Netflix said the company was assessing the impact of current events.
On Monday, The Walt Disney Company announced it will be pausing all theatrical releases in Russia, including Pixar’s Turning Red, set to premiere there on March 10. A few hours after the announcement, Warner Bros halted the release of ‘The Batman’ in the country.
Russia has also been barred from major festivals and award shows. The Cannes Film Festival announced on Tuesday that it will not welcome any Russian delegations or attendees with ties to the government.
Switzerland’s Locarno Film Festival, however, announced it would show Russian films at the upcoming edition in August.
Russia’s intensifying attack on Ukraine has forced hundreds of thousands to leave the country in the last six days in what one UN official predicted could become Europe’s biggest refugee crisis this century.
One Web Cancels Russian Launches: The British satellite company OneWeb has said it is cancelling all launches from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, which is run by the Russian Aerospace Forces and Russia’s space agency, Roscosmos.
The firm said in a one-line statement that “the Board of OneWeb has voted to suspend all launches from Baikonur”, AP reported from London.
OneWeb had been due to launch a batch of its Internet satellites Friday on Russian rockets from the base.
The launch was put in doubt after Russia demanded the British government sell its stake in OneWeb, which it partly owns. It also wanted a guarantee from the company that none of its satellites would have military uses.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has thrown international space cooperation into turmoil and put a planned Europe-Russian mission to Mars this year on hold.