MOSCOW, May 16. /TASS/. Russia Foreign Ministry has sent notes of protest to Ukraine over the situation with journalists, Deputy Foreign Minister Grigory Karasin said.

"I think, there were two [notes]. The notes expressed a fair amount of concern," he said in response to a question on the matter.

On May 15, the Ukrainian Security Service (SBU) carried out a large-scale operation against RIA Novosti Ukraine staff members, accusing them of high treason. The news agency’s chief editor Kirill Vyshinsky was detained outside his home early on Tuesday. Soon after that, searches were conducted in the news agency’s Kiev office and press center, as well as in some journalists’ apartments. At the same time, the SBU issued a statement claiming that "a network of media structures, which Moscow used for carrying out a hybrid war" against Kiev had been exposed.

The Russian embassy in Kiev demanded that the Ukrainian authorities take all the necessary measures to stop violence against media workers, immediately release the detained journalist, launch an impartial investigation into the incident and punish those abusing power.