Russia holds over 25 Ukrainian journalists in captivity
Over 25 Ukrainian journalists are being held in Russian captivity.
Source: Ukrinform news agency, citing Yaroslav Yurchyshyn, Chairman of the Ukrainian Parliamentary Committee on Freedom of Speech, a lawmaker from the Holos (Voice) faction
Quote: "Two big issues. The first is finding mechanisms to facilitate the release of captured journalists. The latest data indicates that over 25 of your colleagues are currently in captivity. They are not combatants; they are journalists who were doing their job and, according to civilised rules of warfare, should not have been held captive in principle, but the fact is the fact. We understand how uncivilised Russia is and how it has ignored any human rights at all."
Details: The lawmaker noted that one of the priorities of his work as chairman of the committee is to protect the rights of journalists.
Yurchyshyn believes that, on the one hand, it is necessary to engage the international community as much as possible in freeing journalists, and on the other hand, "jointly with monitoring organisations and journalistic associations, to prepare a component on liability in the International Criminal Court for crimes against freedom of speech, for crimes against journalists, and possibly to strengthen such liability by defining a range of concepts in Ukrainian legislation."
At the same time, Yurchyshyn added, "Unfortunately, it is not only Russia that hinders the proper work of journalists".
Quote: "We have a drop in investigations of crimes against journalists by almost 80% in 2022 compared to those in 2021. We can attribute everything to the war, but as a country that is joining the European community, for which the value of freedom of speech is one of the core pillars, we should definitely not allow this to happen.
That is why we have communicated with the Ministry of Internal Affairs, we are planning to do the same with the National Police and the Prosecutor General's Office, and we will hold hearings in the committee to investigate cases of impeding journalistic activity. We are waiting for the 2023 data to be available so that we can consider the actual information."
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