Journalists reporting from conflict zones in Ukraine are subjected to violence

According to Media Freedom Watch, Dunja Mijatović, the OSCE Representative on Freedom of the Media, expressed deep concern about new cases of detention and attacks on journalists covering the situation in Eastern Ukraine.

“I remain deeply concerned about the ongoing negative pattern in relation to journalists’ safety in Ukraine,” Mijatović said after Ukrainian separatists captured Simon Ostrovsky, an American journalist. “I call on all those responsible to stop harassing and attacking journalists and let them do their job. Simon Ostrovsky should be released immediately,” Mijatović asked.

The issue of violence faced by journalists in Ukraine was also examined during a three-day visit that the OSCE representative made last week to Kharkov, Kiev and Odessa.

In this context, Mijatović found that freedom of the media in Ukraine reached a critical level. Journalists in conflict zones are being subjected to violence, detained and threatened, and their equipment is being destroyed. The OSCE representative concluded that the freedom of the media reflects the overall situation in Ukraine.

During the past week, mediafreedomwatch.org published several articles about cases of assault, intimidation and kidnapping of journalists covering events in Ukraine. The list of victims includes the following names: Maxim Danilchenko (reporter of the Tochka opory newspaper), assaulted during a protest in Luhansk; Yevheniy Gapich (freelance correspondent of site Okna), who went missing in Donetsk; Artyom Deineg (journalist from Sloviansk), captured in his own apartment during a live broadcast; Dmitriy Galko (journalist with Belarusian Novy Chas newspaper) and Serhiy Lefter (freelance journalist, observer of the Open Dialogue Fund), both also detained by separatists in Slaviansk, Ukraine. A case of assault was reported on the night to 23 April, when the premises of the editorial office of the Provintsia newspaper in Constantinovka, Donetsk region, were burned.  

According to the media, since the beginning of separatist movements supported by Moscow, journalists of various nationalities (French, Italian, Canadian, Ukrainian, Russian, etc.) have been subjected to violence for covering the situation in the conflict zones of Ukraine.