Is CS:GO Really Banned in Russia?
Will there no longer be any more 'B-Rush' callout by Russians in the server?!
Cover-Credits:
On 24th February the world woke up to the news of Russia invading its neighboring country Ukraine after weeks of escalated tension . The President of Russia - Vladimir Putin, had launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine labeled as a 'military operation', initially hitting multiple key military targets which were soon followed by shelling on cities like Luhansk, Donetsk, Kharkiv (Second largest Ukrainian city), Kyiv (Capital of Ukraine), and many others including important facilities and structures.
Soon after multiple countries started supporting the 'No War' campaign while also imposing various sanctions against Russia. During this time, some CS:GO fans allegedly started supporting a petition on change.org to ban the Russian gaming community from playing the game.
Also, an image that has now gone viral, claiming that Gabe Logan Newell - CEO of Valve would ban CS:GO and Dota 2 in Russia, started spreading across social media at that point in time. But is there any hint of truth to this news?
No.
Is CS:GO banned in Russia: Real or Fake?
An inspection of the alleged viral news snippet made it obvious that it is absolutely fake. The first red flag was that no link was associated to the image that could redirect users to the actual article or news piece. Further, no other local or reputed news outlet had reported about this incident, which would not have been the case if this was actually true.
No official statement from Valve, Gabe Newell, or any other senior executive associated to the company has been made in regards to the reported incident so far.
All of this is enough to prove that the information is clearly false without any truth attached to it, at least at the time of writing this article. Also, the Reddit post linked above has since been deleted while the petition was also removed shortly afterwards.
So far both CS:GO and Dota 2 continue to be accessible to all players in Russia. Neither the country nor Valve themselves has banned any of the titles from the publisher.
The entire esports community has been actively involved when it comes to expressing their thoughts and opinions on the Ukraine crisis, be it the players or organizations.
Additionally, many esports tournaments taking place in Europe and CIS (Commonwealth of Independent States) regions have also been postponed indefinitely due to the instability in the region.
