On 13 June 2023, an official in Kryvyi Rih threatened to cancel journalists’ accreditation after they took photos of body bags near the site of a recent Russian missile attack, said photo correspondent Stas Kozliuk, one of the journalists concerned. According to him, the threat came from a woman likely employed at the communications department of the regional military administration, who was present at the scene. The woman claimed journalists were not allowed to take photos of bodies without the consent of the victims’ families, despite the fact that the body bags were closed and the victims could not be identified, the photojournalist said.
Police later arrived to the scene and did not forbid journalists from carrying out their work, Kozliuk added. According to Arzu Vasylyshyna, the head of the communications department of the Dnipro regional military adiministration, the ban on taking photos of body bags was imposed by police, she said quoted by IMI, a Kyiv-based press freedom group. Vasylyshyna also refused to provide the name of the military administration employee who threatened to withdraw the journalists’ accreditation, IMI wrote.