On 1 March 2023, TV Rain correspondent Arden Arkmyan was detained by police in Russia’s Belgorod region, near the country’s border with Ukraine. Authorities arrested the journalist working for Russia’s largest independent TV channel after a volunteer who was driving him around the area denounced him to the police. As reported by TV Rain, volunteer Yevgeni Bakalo drove Arkmyan to a village near the Ukrainian border, where he stepped out of the car to make a phone call. In the ensuing conversation, recorded by a microphone Arkmyan had earlier placed on his chest, Bakalo claimed the journalist worked for an “enemy media outlet”, described him and TV Rain using a homophobic slur, and suggested police should “shake him up a little”. Soon after, police arrived and brought both Arkmyan and Bakalo to a border crossing. While the volunteer was set free, police interrogated the TV Rain correspondent and demanded he delete all the photos and videos he took, saying that they showed the “defensive line” in the Belgorod region (a system of concrete anti-tank defense blocks), claiming that taking photos of these was illegal. Authorities also confiscated Arkmyan’s electronic devices and kept him for three hours in a room where a guard was holding him at gunpoint. It was unclear whether the electronics were later returned.