Ilia Vitiuk was an affable and charismatic man when he spoke to EL PAÍS in kyiv on February 7. Vitiuk was the head of Cybersecurity at the Security Services of Ukraine (SSU). With this newspaper he spoke about Russian cyberattacks during the invasion of his country, a topic that he masters and with which he felt comfortable. He was less friendly with Yevhen Shulhat, a journalist from the media Slide Info, which on April 4 revealed alleged irregular real estate transactions by Vitiuk’s family. Three days earlier, while Shulhat was investigating the case, he was harassed by two soldiers and an SSU agent: they identified him by surprise while he was visiting a shopping center to urge him to enlist in the army. Slide Info He was able to discover, thanks to the establishment’s security cameras, the identity of the SSU officer who led the operation, a man close to Vitiuk. He was removed from office on May 1 by the president, Volodymyr Zelensky.
Investigative journalism has been a risky profession in Ukraine for decades. The death in 2000 of the newspaper’s founder Pravda, Georgy Gongadze, was a national scandal that put President Leonid Kuchma on the ropes. Gongadze was investigating corruption in the Government and was murdered by four police officers. His newspaper is today a reference medium for the country, also in the supervision of power, and his figure is an icon of the effort of Ukrainian society to democratize the system. Media and non-governmental organizations now warn that impunity has increased during the war.
The difference is that Ukraine is under the international spotlight today more than ever. His status as a candidate to join the European Union represents a leap forward in the fight against corruption and institutional transparency. And its European allies, but above all the United States, also demand control measures and monitor where the tens of millions of euros that are transferred to Ukraine in financial and military aid end up.
A total of 16 entities defending human rights On April 12, they published a manifesto in which they alerted the Government and to the judiciary about the increasingly frequent practice of denouncing activists and journalists for allegedly failing to comply with the obligation to join the ranks. The manifesto, which names two activists and four reporters affected by this practice in recent months, indicates: “With this strategy of discrediting activists and investigative journalists, law enforcement violates the presumption of innocence and manipulates the issue of mobilization. “These actions are unacceptable and deliberately shift the focus of public attention.” The text emphasizes that these pressures “discredit Ukraine internationally and play into the hands of Russian propaganda that spreads the narrative of a country [Ucrania] authoritarian and undemocratic.”
The Ukrainian branch of the NGO Transparency International, one of the signatories of the manifesto, issued a statement on January 17 warning that “attacks on journalists are becoming systematic.” “Transparency International Ukraine considers that any form of pressure against journalists is unacceptable, especially given the country’s aspirations to join the European Union,” he added.
This statement was released following a case of coercion that has been investigated by the Prosecutor’s Office and that even caused Zelensky to intervene. The digital medium Bihus, specialized in investigative reporting on cases of malpractice in power, was spied on for months by the SSU. Videos of the private lives of members of the editorial team were recorded by their agents and spread on social networks.
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Not all press complaints are situations of harassment like the one suffered by Bihus either Slidstvo Info. The Institute for Mass Information (IMI) is an NGO analyzing journalism in Ukraine. Every month it publishes a barometer of press freedom. The last one available, from March, counted 16 cases of rape of freedom of expression in Ukraine. Seven of them, the most violent – war actions and cyber attacks – were committed by the Russian occupying forces; nine were complaints on the Ukrainian side, the majority (four), complaints from various media outlets due to the refusal of various institutions of the Administration—including Parliament—to provide public information.
Two media outlets and two NGOs have preferred not to give their opinion for this article. The editor of a communications company who has been a victim of political pressure agreed to explain, on the condition that her name not be given, the reason for these refusals: “At this moment, when Ukraine faces a new major Russian offensive, it is more important and relevant to talk about this and not about other issues.”
“I would say that in Ukraine there is a free press, but there are some restrictions and a lot of self-censorship,” German Viola von Cramon, MEP and vice president of the commission for parliamentary relations with Ukraine, told the Interfax agency on April 27: “These journalists think that ‘if I publish this, if I write that, it can help Putin discredit Ukraine.’ And of course, this is not good for journalism.”
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The MEP from the German Greens focused on one of the most controversial aspects of Zelensky’s presidency, the control with which he subjects critical media, especially through the unified television news Telethon, launched during the war and which all channels must broadcast. “There is a tendency in the president’s office to not give a voice to the opposition or critics. With the Telethon “It has made pluralism in the media sector practically disappear,” said Von Cramon.
The US State Department released its annual report on the human rights situation in Ukraine this April. The document puts the Telethon as an example of control over information: “The Government has vetoed, blocked or sanctioned media and journalists considered a threat to national security or who expressed opinions that go against territorial integrity. Some opinion leaders critical of the Government were banned from public news. Investigative journalists have sometimes been the target of smear campaigns. Other practices affect press freedom, including self-censorship.”
Serhiy Leshchenko, advisor to the Ukrainian presidency, assured the state agency Ukrinform on April 29 that without the Telethon “There would be media chaos that would make it easier to weaken society internally.” “He Telethon “It was created to be a source of truthful information, not falsehoods,” he added. Leshchenko implicitly threatened the opposition with being investigated by the SSU: “Ukrainian politicians who spread disinformation are fully in tune with Russia. This is a question for the intelligence services, why are there Ukrainian politicians who spread this information? Are they part of Russian propaganda or are they useful idiots?”
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