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Diplomat says Euronews politically biased in covering Crimean Tatars deportation in 1944

The Russian Foreign Ministry’s official spokeswoman promised to send an official letter to the channel managers with a request to clarify the position of the channel
Russian Foreign Ministry’s spokeswoman Maria Zakharova Anton Novoderezhkin/TASS
Russian Foreign Ministry’s spokeswoman Maria Zakharova
© Anton Novoderezhkin/TASS

MOSCOW, May 20. /TASS/. Euronews TV channel authorizes politically biased coverage of Crimean Tatars’ deportation in 1944, Russian Foreign Ministry’s spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on Friday.

"In principle, the channel presents the topic in an exclusively politically influenced manner," Zakharova told the Govorit Moscow radio station, commenting on the channel’s coverage in (English) about deportations of two million Crimean Tatars in May 1944 from Crimea.

"First, we were speaking directly to the channel, then we made it public after failing to notice any changes in their position," she said.

In particular, the Euronews TV channel covered the events marking an anniversary of Crimean Tatars’ deportation exclusively from Kiev’s position.

"The broadcaster did not say a single word about events in the Russian Federation in the context of the Crimean Tatars theme. In the context of that date," Zakharova said.

Earlier, a biased approach in the news coverage had been noticed in the Euronews Russian segment, she said.

"In principle, there are shifts," she said. "If two years ago, the Russian version of the Euronews website was inappropriate to reality as now the news in English about Russia, we seem to have found a balance to this attitude."

The Russian Foreign Ministry’s official spokeswoman promised to send an official letter to the channel managers with a request to clarify this position of the channel.

"First of all, the channel needs it since it claims to be a mass media outlet, not a propagandistic mouthpiece," she went on to say.

Earlier in the day, Zakharova wrote on her Facebook page that Euronews TV channel published false information on its website about deportation of Crimean Tatars in 1944 and an alleged ban on commemorative events in Russia’s Crimea. She that the TV channel should officially apologize. Later, the channel posted a new edition of the report, decreasing the earlier number of deported Crimean Tatars from two million to 200,000.