Captured journalists mentioned in PACE resolution for first time as separate category – MP

A PACE resolution adopted today contains for the first time a separate mention of captured journalists, including many civilian journalists who documented the crimes of the Russian authorities in occupied Crimea.

MP Yevheniia Kravchuk said this in a comment to an Ukrinform correspondent.

"For the first time, the resolution mentions a separate category of civilian prisoners - these are captured journalists. There are more than thirty of them, at least those that have already been identified," Kravchuk said.

According to her, many people in temporarily occupied territories people become civilian journalists, and it is difficult to register them, since they are not officially media workers.

"Since there is no free media in these territories, they actually play the role of journalists, recording war crimes, and that is why they are imprisoned for years. And a significant share of these people are Crimean Tatars," she said.

Kravchenko said it was important to remind in the text of the document that these people have been in captivity since 2014, when the Russian Federation occupied Crimea and part of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions.

As reported, on October 2, PACE adopted the first resolution concerning Ukrainian prisoners of war and civilians held in Russian captivity.

Photo credit: Yevheniia Kravchuk