Volodymyr Zelenskyy, President of Ukraine, has stated that the Security Service of Ukraine (SSU) will find those guilty of illegal surveillance of Ukrainian journalists. Source: Zelenskyy in an interview for British TV channel Channel 4 News, full version of which was published by the Office of the President of Ukraine Details: The host asked Zelenskyy about the situation with independent journalists in Ukraine who were "intimidated, some of them physically".
The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has called on the Ukrainian authorities to investigate threats to journalist Yurii Nikolov and the surveillance of the Bihus.info team and bring those responsible to justice.
Investigative journalists in Ukraine came under two attacks in just the past week, one involving a threatening home visit and another using covert surveillance. The two incidents are the latest in a series of discrediting campaigns against independent Ukrainian media, often supported by anonymous pro-government Telegram channels, raising concerns about increasing pressure on press freedom in wartime Ukraine. “These are not ordinary cases when journalists are obstructed by (someone’s) security guards, for example, or not allowed to go somewhere,” Oksana Romaniuk, the head of the Institute of Mass Information, a Ukrainian NGO monitoring violations of freedom of speech, told the Kyiv Independent.
The Prosecutor General's Office said that the case is investigated as obstructing journalistic work. The penalty for the crime ranges from a fine to four years in prison.
The Kyiv City Prosecutor's Office has opened a criminal investigation into the obstruction of the work of investigative journalist Yurii Nikolov after unknown individuals attempted to enter his home and threatened him.