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Turkmenistan protests to Ukraine over spread of false information about country in media

The Foreign Ministry noted that the channel’s reporters have feel for modern Turkmenistan, have never visited the country, and had no contacts with representatives of state and public structures of the republic, with Turkmen journalists

ASHGABAT, July 8. /TASS/. Turkmenistan has protested against the biased information about the country published in the Ukrainian media, the Foreign Ministry said.

"In connection with the biased reports disseminated by the Ukrainian media about Turkmenistan, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Turkmenistan declares the following. The Turkmen side expresses its protest over the biased and untrue information broadcast on July 8 of this year on the Ukrainian television channel Freedom about the alleged 'closed nature’ of the internet in Turkmenistan," the ministry said in a statement.

The Foreign Ministry noted that the channel’s reporters have feel for modern Turkmenistan, have never visited the country, and had no contacts with representatives of state and public structures of the republic, with Turkmen journalists.

"It should be noted that this is not the first time that the Freedom TV channel has misinformed the audience by broadcasting obviously implausible and distorted information about Turkmenistan. All this is happening against the background of many years of economic and humanitarian support provided by the Turkmen side to the Ukrainian people since Turkmenistan first gained independence," the statement read.

The ministry said that since the 1990s, Turkmenistan has been supplying natural gas to Ukraine in significant volumes, and several Ukrainian companies have implemented many projects in Turkmenistan in energy, road transport, communications, infrastructure and other areas "worth billions of US dollars." These companies are currently operating in the country.

"Based on the above, the Turkmen side demands that the relevant state bodies of Ukraine responsible for the information policy take the necessary measures in accordance with Ukrainian legislation to prevent the repetition of the above facts in the future," the ministry stressed.

The Freedom TV channel, a Ukrainian state-owned foreign broadcasting channel, was launched in 2015, first under the name Ukraine Tomorrow, later UATV. The channel's main target audience was Russian-speaking viewers. In 2020, the information and entertainment TV channel Dom was created on the basis of UATV, which began satellite broadcasting to the territories of Donbass and the Republic of Crimea not controlled by Kiev.