On 13 September 2023, journalists at Zhar.info, an online news portal in the city of Khmelnytskiy, western Ukraine, said local authorities were regularly refusing to provide comments on events in the city and region. Journalist Alona Bereza cited the example of a Russian bombing in the region on August 28, on which she was reportedly not able to receive a comment from authorities. Bereza said she and her colleagues addressed the first deputy head of the regional military administration of Khmelnytskiy, Serhiy Tyurin, on August 16, 18 and 21, but did not receive a response. The journalist said she tried to contact the administration again on the morning of August 28, but that this attempt was also unsuccessful.
On the same day, she and her camera operator attempted to meet the administration’s communication service in person to understand why her requests were not being answered. Security at the military administration’s office refused to have the media workers enter on the grounds that their visit “had not been agreed upon”. Bereza and her camera operator protested, demanding that security get in touch with representatives of the communications department, following which the personnel told them they were in a “military facility” and pointed their firearms at them.
The media workers called the police, which arrived to the scene and accepted their complaint against security personnel for “obstructing journalistic activities”. The investigation into the incident would be conducted by Ukraine’s State Investigative Bureau, not by police, due to the security personnel’s military status, Bereza reported. The journalist said she had since not received an update on the case, and that the local military administration was still refusing to provide her with comments.
Commenting on the case, Roman Holovenko, a lawyer with Ukraine’s Institute of Mass Information (IMI), said that Ukrainian laws give journalists the right to be received by civil servants “within a reasonable period”, but that civil servants are not legally obliged to provide media with comments. If these situations occur, journalists can simply mention that a civil servant has refused to provide a comment, Holovenko said.