Journalists Unions Call for Release of Detained Ukrainian journalists

Journalists Unions attending the IFJ/EFJ meeting for affiliates in Eastern Europe held in Macedonia expressed concern about the fate of up to eight Ukrainian journalists who went missing, believed to be detained against their will in the territory of the self-proclaimed Donetsk and Lugansk People's Republic. Participants condemned the detention of media workers as unacceptable and called for those responsible to ensure their immediate release. Such actions violate basic human rights and have a negative impact on the state of freedom of speech. While participants welcomed the recent release of blogger Dmitry Potekhina and Yegor Vorobyov, they also call for Ukraine and Russian government agencies to make all efforts to locate and release the following eight journalists: Yuri Lelyavsky, Roman Cheremsky, Valery Makeev, Alexander Bilokobylsky, Sergei Sakadynsky, Alexander Kudinov, Eugene Shlyakhtin and Eugene Timofeev.