Ukrainian journalist Svitlana Zalizetska’s was blackmailed by Russian troops who kidnapped her 75-year-old father and said he would only be released if she returned to the besieged city of Melitopol. Zalizetska is the head of the Ria-Melitopol website in the city. She told media that Russian troops broke into her house at 7am on March 23 and kidnapped her father. Her retired parents had been at the property at the time. Among the group who searched the house were two soldiers with machine guns. “They told my mother that they would release my father only after I come back,” Zalizetska said. According to her, Halyna Danylchenko, who was installed by Russian troops to run the city, told her to cooperate with the occupying forces. According to Zalizetskaya, her father was released after she agreed to publish an application to transfer control of the RIA-Melitopol website to third parties. According to media reports, her father was released on March 25.
UPDATE: On 25 April, Svitlana Zalizetska told IMI that for the past three weeks she had been receiveing threats of interrogations and torture from unknown Russian sources, similar to those received by a number of other Ukrainian media and journalists in the past weeks. The threats come as comments under her social media posts, private messages, calls and emails.