On August 14, Ukraine expelled Russia’s VGTRK
Media Group journalist Tamara Nersesyan for causing a "threat to the
country’s security".
MOSCOW, August 15. /TASS/. Russia is indignant at Ukraine’s expelling a Russian journalist and demands Kiev observe its liabilities in the sphere of the freedom of mass media, the Russian Foreign Ministry said on Tuesday.
"Official
Kiev continues its policy of hampering activities of the mass media and
systematically supplements the list of foreign journalists banned from entry to
Ukraine," the ministry said. "On August 14, Ukraine’s Security
Service officers detained Tamara Nersesyan, a correspondent of Russia’s VGTRK
broadcaster. After hours of questioning, she was taken to the Russian border
late at night. She had to walk to the Russian border by foot."
These
actions of the Ukrainian authorities stemmed from the decision of the Ukrainian
Security Service, which qualified reports of the Russian journalist as a
"threat to Ukraine’s security and territorial integrity," the
ministry noted.
"Notably,
this is not the first incident when Ukraine expelled journalists under such
pretext. Earlier, in July, the Ukrainian Security Service expelled from the
country a journalist of Russia’s Rossiya-1 and Rossiya-24 television
channels, Maria Knyazeva," the ministry reminded.
Russia
calls on "the OSCE Representative on Freedom of the Media, Harlem Desir,
to pay attention to the Ukrainian authorities’ policy towards journalists and
give a principled assessment to their activities," the ministry added.
Source: ITAR-TASS 16-08-2017
