Ukrainian Court Bans Russian TV Broadcast
TEHRAN (Tasnim) - The majority of Ukrainian providers stopped broadcasting four main Russian TV channels in a move the Russian Foreign Ministry calls a violation of international obligations and an attack on media freedom.
Ukraine’s own media, although generally sharing the coup government’s point of view on the situation in Ukraine, has also come under attack recently, RT reported.
A Ukrainian nationalist MP assisted by a group of helpers – claiming to be members of a new media regulator – abused interim head of Ukraine’s National TV and bullied him into signing his resignation last week, accusing him of being not pro-Ukrainian enough. While the rights and media professionals groups condemned the attack, authorities appointed a new head of the broadcasting company.
Kiev's authorities in the meantime deny the rise of far-right extremism in a new democratic Ukraine and advise Moscow to instead “draw attention to the growth of the manifestations of fascism, xenophobia, and ethnic offenses in the Russian Federation,” according to Ukraine's Foreign Ministry statement, cited by NB news.
The Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) has previously voiced numerous concerns over the attack on Russian TV channels in Ukraine by the self-installed government.
“Banning programming without a legal basis is a form of censorship; national security concerns should not be used at the expense of media freedom,” OSCE Representative on Freedom of the Media Dunja Mijatović said earlier this month.
“While I deplore any kind of state propaganda and hate speech as part of the current information war, everyone has the right to receive information from as many sources as he or she wishes,” Mijatovic said. “Switching off and banning channels is not the way to address these problems; any potentially problematic speech should be countered with arguments and more speech.”
