Ukraine’s State Security Service has found evidence that Kiril Vyshynsky, a journalist of Russian propagandist RIA-Novosti news agency and a Ukrainian citizen, could have committed treason, SBU Deputy Chief Viktor Kononenko said at a press briefing in Kyiv on May 15.
Earlier, the SBU detained Vyshynsky near his house in Kyiv. Kononenko said a decision on his arrest would be taken in the coming hours.
Kononenko said SBU had searched two offices and two flats, including Vyshynsky’s apartment, and found that Vyshynsky has a Russian state Medal for the Return and Crimea (the Ukrainian territory invaded and occupied by Russia in 2014), which he received by a secret order from Russian President Vladimir Putin.
“In spring 2014 Vyshynsky received an order to go to Crimea for subversive activities. For these actions, Vyshynsky was awarded the Medal for the Return of Crimea,” Kononenko said.
Kononenko added that Vyshynsky was managing the pro-Kremlin propagandist media outlet RIA-Novosti Ukraine in Kyiv, which wasn’t officially registered in Ukraine and which was funded by Russian money delivered via Serbia.
He said that Vyshynsky was receiving at least 53,000 euros (almost $63,000) per month for this.
From RIA-Novosti’s Kyiv’s office, Vyshynsky was also supporting the activities of the Russian-backed separatists in Donbas, Kononenko said, adding that the journalist-propagandist also has a Russian Medal of Merit.
The searchers also found that Vyshynsky has a Russian passport in addition to his Ukrainian one. As he is a Ukrainian national, the SBU and Prosecutors’ Office of Crimea in exile are investigating him for treason, a crime punishable by from 12 to 15 years in jail.
Ukrainian Prosecutor General Yuriy Lutsenko posted on his Facebook page photos of a map of “Novorossiya” (New Russia), which depicts southern and eastern portions of Ukraine, along with the bunch of the St. George ribbons, a symbol of Russian-backed separatism in Crimea and Donbas, which he said were found by law enforcers during their searches.
“Russian state propagandists opened (the office of) RIA-Novosti Ukraine in Kyiv,” Lutsenko wrote on his Facebook.
“The investigators have evidence of well paid anti-Ukrainian attacks by this agency.”
RIA-Novosti, which used to be an international Russian government news agency, has since 2013 gradually turned into one of the most strident voices of Russian propaganda.
Putin’s spokesperson Dmitry Peskov threatened Ukraine of the “reciprocal measures” that Kremlin would take against Ukraine’s media in response to the SBU’s actions.
