On Feb. 2, President Volodymyr Zelensky signed a decree issuing financial sanctions against pro-Russian lawmaker Taras Kozak and his three nationwide TV channels — NewsOne, Channel 112, and ZIK.
As a result of Zelensky’s decree, Kozak’s channels were immediately shut down.
Kozak, who represents the 44-member Opposition Platform — For Life faction in parliament, is the nominal owner of the TV channels, but Ukrainian media and politicians believe the real owner to be Viktor Medvedchuk, the leader of Opposition Platform and a close friend of Russian President Vladimir Putin. Kozak and Medvedchuk deny it.
Reacting to the sanctions, the three TV channels and representatives of Opposition Platform accused Zelensky of censorship and of an attack on the freedom of speech in Ukraine. However, media experts agree that Medvedchuk’s channels never had freedom of speech. Instead, they were spreading disinformation and propaganda.
Below are just severla examples of how the channels were echoing Russian propaganda and undermining Ukraine.
Justifying Russian occupation of Crimea:
- Yuri Dudkin, a frequent guest on ZIK, said on Sept. 9, that the Russian army saved Crimea from the Ukrainian army and the potential deaths it could have caused.
- Lawmaker Oleg Voloshin, representing the Opposition Platform — For Life party, said on air that by annexing Crimea, Russia stopped the “future big war” that could have started if NATO soldiers were deployed in Ukraine after the Euromaidan Revolution that ended the rule of Kremlin-backed President Viktor Yanukovych in 2014.
Blaming Ukraine for Russia’s war in eastern Donbas:
- Lawmaker Renat Kuzmin, a former fugitive who’s now representing the Opposition Platform, said on ZIK that “a group Ukrainian conspirators seized power through the revolution, and then ‘to maintain their own power, started a war in Donbas.”
- Ruslan Kotsaba, who was previously sentenced to 3.5 years in prison for treason, hosts a show on NewsOne. In 2019, he said on air that it was “the Kyiv conspirators and traitors who illegally declared an anti-terrorist operation in Donbas,” when Russianled militants began occupying government buildings.
- Former pro-Russian lawmaker Olena Lukash said in a NewsOne studio that “Russia helps occupied Donbas in the same way that the United States and the European Union are helping Ukraine.” · Renat Kuzmin said on Channel 112 that “the militarization of Donbas was a desperate attempt to protect these territories from the state criminals who seized power in Kyiv.”
- On NewsOne, Oleksandr Kachny, a lawmaker from Medvedchuk’s party, praised the occupied territories, saying that they live “in Ukraine, which still has (the Russian) language, which still has the (Moscow-led orthodox) faith, which still has peace. They don’t rename streets, they haven’t demolished monuments (to Communist leader Vladimir Lenin), they don’t have decommunization.”
Blaming Ukraine for continuing the war:
- Guest speaker Irina Palamar said on ZIK that Russia would have ended the war, but Ukraine is continuing it.
- Renat Kuzmin told ZIK that “the Americans forbid Ukraine to stop the war.”
- Viktor Medvedchuk said on Channel 112 that Ukraine had disrupted the Minsk peace talks because it had not accepted Russia’s demands to change Ukraine’s electoral system. Marginalizing Ukrainian language, culture, identity:
- On Sept. 12, NewsOne invited a woman presented as “Yevhenya Pranova, the mother of two,” who stated that if Ukraine is prioritizing Ukrainians, the state will have to be reduced to five oblasts. (Ukraine consists of 24 oblasts).
- Alexander Semchenko, a blogger known for xenophobia and bigotry, stated on Channel 112 that “Ukrainians are, in fact, Russians,” “I don’t understand how Russians differ from Ukrainians” and “we are forced to believe that we are a separate nation.”
- ZIK host Diana Panchenko said that many people, including her mother, are “annoyed” when they are spoken to in Ukrainian.
Promoting one party — Opposition Platform — For Life:
- “I am working here to ensure that the Opposition Platform — For Life party achieves significant electoral success,” said Channel 112 host Vyacheslav Pikhovshek.
