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Public Chamber asks Foreign Ministry to protect rights of Russian journalists in Ukraine

Earlier correspondent Khudyakov was abducted by unidentified persons

Rallies in Donetsk (archive) EPA/PHOTOMIG

Rallies in Donetsk (archive)

© EPA/PHOTOMIG

MOSCOW, March 25, 21:16 /ITAR-TASS/. Member of the Public Chamber of Russia Maxim Grigoryev turned to the Russian Foreign Ministry in connection with the violation of the rights of journalist Aleksey Khudyakov in Ukraine.

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According to the information of the Public Chamber, Aleksey Khudyakov, journalist of the on-line publication Segodnya.ru, was in Donetsk from February to March fulfilling the editorial board’s assignment. The correspondent published several articles criticizing the current Ukrainian authorities. According to the information of the Public Chamber, Aleksey Khudyakov was abducted in the evening of March 19 by unidentified persons some 200 metres from the hotel, where he was staying, and was taken to a forest.

“One of the kidnappers posed himself as an officer of Ukraine’s Security Service but refused to present any documents,” Aleksei Khudyakov told members of the Public Chamber. “The kidnappers tried to intimidate me, making threats, even death threats. They asserted that I had taken a wrong view of the situation, threatened with a long detention in Kiev and compelled me to mention my relatives in Moscow and give their telephone numbers.

The correspondent said that he was compelled by threats to sign documents that he was ready to work for Ukraine’s Security Service as an agent in Moscow. He said Ukraine-registered SIM-cards, the phone’s memory stick had been stolen from him, photo and video materials had been destroyed and he was carried to the border with the Rostov region and turned over to border guards for deportation.

Grigoryev has said that he made a recording with Aleksey Khudyakov to be broadcast by radio Voice of Russia and he believes that all journalists should protest against glaring violations of the right to freedom of speech.

“This was a veritable infringement of freedom,” the member of the Public Chamber said. “We have conveyed the information to the Foreign Ministry so that Aleksey Khudyakov should be given assistance and that this case should be brought to public notice".

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