Since the beginning of the full-scale invasion, the media structure of Ukraine was significantly damaged. 15% of the country's regional broadcasters stopped their work in the temporarily occupied territories. Among them, there are 14 regional and 53 local television companies, 18 regional and 7 local radio stations, and 46 Internet providers. The newsrooms in the Ukraine-controlled parts of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions, which had already experienced occupation and forced relocation since 2014, were somewhat better mobilized and ready for such a development. Experts spoke about this during the online discussion "Occupied" on Monday, July 4.
OPORA's senior analyst Oleksandr Kliuzhev notes that the situation with the withdrawal of the Ukrainian Armed Forces from Lysychansk was a key topic in the information space of both the russian mass media and on the occupied territories.
"Russian propagandists and their henchmen staged a big event in the temporarily occupied territories. Actually, we know that the minister of defense of the russian federation informed the kremlin leader about the seizure of control over the Luhansk region. We will not analyze the military aspects here, we know that the Ukrainian Armed Forces did everything to protect these territories and weaken the enemy. But the fact remains that the russians, who announced a huge victory in Ukraine back in February, due to the absence of these victories, must present the situation around Lysychansk as a major event, as a certain turning point in the war against Ukraine. It is important that our citizens and our public leaders do not play along with these actions of russian propagandists and the russian state. In my personal opinion, there was certain matchmaking, it was still there. Here I am referring to the video footagess from Russian sources that were disseminated in the Ukrainian information space with the alleged greeting of ramzan kadyrov’s subdivisions by the locals. This is an extremely unpleasant situation when the Ukrainian public space becomes a tool for russian propaganda. Regardless of any emotions and feelings, we must always remember that it is unacceptable to use propaganda videos of the russian occupiers in the domestic socio-political discussion. It is a very difficult discussion because we understand that people are worried about leaving every populated place in Ukraine. But even in these emotions and these experiences, we must adhere to standards. We have the only standards – we do not use the occupiers’ resources in our own domestic discussions," Oleksandr Kliuzhev said.
Moreover, an important event in the occupied territories of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions was the decision of the so-called local administrations to appoint ministers in the pseudo-government of the so-called republics. These positions are occupied by citizens of russia, as it has already been publicly announced that the locals are unable to cope with the situation. It is humiliating that people cannot influence the development of their communities, while the propaganda boasts of the fact that intelligent experts from Russia will teach them this.
Unfortunately, the involvement of the occupied territories in internal processes in the russian federation is growing. In fact, the leader of this process is the first deputy head of putin 's administration sergey kiriyenko. At the level of specific bureaucratic mechanisms, russia increasingly seizes resources in the occupied territories and establishes close ties and control mechanisms there.
In addition, the state duma of russia made a decision to simplify the procedure for obtaining russian passports in the occupied territories – fees for registration were canceled. The strengthening of passportization should be a signal for those European politicians who still believe in the possibility of an agreement with putin.
Another trend of the past week was the activity of the investigative committee of the russian federation in the occupied territories, especially in the Donbas. There are ongoing attempts of pseudo-authorities to create a quasi-legal justification for initiatives to grossly violate the rights of prisoners of war in Ukraine. russia is indeed planning provocations against Ukrainian prisoners of war, in which russian law enforcement agencies are directly involved.
Maksym Onoprienko, a member of the National Council of Ukraine on Television and Radio Broadcasting, noted that since the beginning of the full-scale invasion, the enemy has been firing rockets at civilian infrastructure objects, including television towers.
"Of course, it's not for no reason. They definitely understand the importance of propaganda – this is what they have been doing for over 20 years. We now see that the real war is preceded by an informational war," Maksym Onoprienko said.
According to him, the media structure of Ukraine has suffered a lot. But if we talk about the thematic component and professionalism, this is a unique period when all broadcasters united their forces, especially in the first weeks, and became a single information front.
"I think everyone has drawn conclusions from this situation. I hope that after our victory, after the end of the war, we will no longer have any dubious messages or narratives on the air of various TV channels. I hope even more that we no longer have opponents of the media reform, which was timely, and now I am absolutely convinced that it is definitely urgently needed," Maksym Onoprienko said.
In his opinion, the actualization of the media reform is caused by two components: the first one is active military operations, and the second one is Ukraine's candidacy for the EU. This is one of the directives that we have to work out and accept.
"The media reform, in fact, will modernize our media legislation and replace, if I'm not mistaken, five existing completely outdated media laws adopted in the early ‘90s. This will directly allow us to respond more promptly to the challenges we see in the information space, first of all, and in the fight against propaganda and fakes that are trying to disseminate in our country, including online," Maksym Onoprienko said.
The expert notes that the situation for Ukrainian media in the occupied territories is difficult and sad.
"If we talk about regional and local TV companies, 14 regional and 53 local TV companies stopped broadcasting in the territories under temporary occupation, as well as 18 regional and 47 local radio stations and 46 providers. In fact, these are sad numbers. If we speak in general, this is 15% of all broadcasters in the country. It seems a small number, but objectively, in the temporarily occupied territories of Kherson, Luhansk, Donetsk, and part of the Zaporizhzhia region, we must not forget that we actually have Zaporizhzhia, where all Ukrainian broadcasters work, but in the rest of the region (Dniprorudne, Enerhodar, Melitopol, Berdiansk) there is no Ukrainian broadcasting. The objects of our KRT concern, the objects of the “Zeonbud” service operator were either destroyed where the TV towers were destroyed, or captured and used by the occupier. Again, a russian multiplex with russian TV channels and russian radio stations was launched in the Zaporizhzhia and Kherson regions. For example, in Berdiansk, there was a popular radio station "Azov Wave", and now it is called "Svobodnyi Berdyansk" and, accordingly, the occupiers broadcast there. Therefore, in their classical forms, television and radio broadcasting, unfortunately, are absent in the occupied territories. Undoubtedly, there are alternative ways, this is, first of all, the Internet – YouTube channels of our broadcasters. The "Diia" application, which works for our citizens, has a package of television channels and radio stations. Satellite broadcasting – with the beginning of the war, we as the National Council appealed to all national broadcasters to decode TV channels and the signal was available to everyone, and it is available. Unfortunately, we do not have the opportunity to have any specific numbers, that is, these alternative ways are there, but it is actually impossible for us to know how many people are watching and listening. We hope for the consciousness of our citizens, we see some partisan movement in the Zaporizhzhia and Kherson regions, and we still hope that our people watch our TV channels and our radio stations," Maksym Onoprienko said.
In his opinion, it is definitely necessary to restore the media infrastructure in the deoccupied territories, for example, Chernihiv and Sumy regions.
According to him, from the point of view of human losses, the most difficult situation regarding TV towers was in Rivne, because 21 people died there. But it was possible to restore broadcasting in full within two days. There is also another unfinished tower in the Rivne region, and the military administration has put its completion on the list of priority expenses.
"As for the territories that are currently close to the zone of active hostilities, or that are close to the temporarily occupied territories, we work there according to importance. Let's call it counter-programming, when more powerful transmitters are installed on the objects that are under our control and directed to those waves on which rashist multiplexes speak, thus interrupting that signal. We have a positive example of the Zaporizhzhia region, when a russian multiplex was launched in Dniprorudnyi, and due to the specifics of the terrain, it reached the Zaporizhzhia district, and even a part of Zaporizhzhia city, where residents were able to watch russian TV channels. A transmitter tuned to the same channel was promptly installed at the facility of the concern, and we solved two problems. First of all, we silenced the signal of the russian TV channels coming our way, but in addition, we were able to cover part of the occupied territory. And now this work is being carried out on all objects, on all TV towers that are along the line of active hostilities or temporarily occupied territory. In order to counteract, so that our people can catch this signal of Ukrainian TV channels and radio stations" Maksym Onoprienko said.
According to him, all border regions, even in the de-occupied territories, have problems with access to Ukrainian broadcasting, including the communities of Chernihiv, Sumy, and Kharkiv regions.
"We have not yet had time to complete the tasks that we set before the active phase on February 24 regarding the problems of the front-line territories, as we received new losses and new problems," Maksym Onoprienko said.
He also notes that the losses of broadcasters occur not only where the towers and studios were damaged. We understand the economic situation in the country – there is practically no advertising market, especially in the regions.
Unfortunately, some channels are suspending broadcasting due to financial difficulties that have already arisen as a result of the hostilities. This should also be taken into account.
“We need to develop mechanisms and programs for support information broadcasting,” Maksym Onoprienko said.
The expert also noted that no examples of fakes and misinformation being spread by Ukrainian broadcasters were observed within the framework of monitoring. But this aspect has obviously moved to the Internet. Therefore, a toolkit is needed. It is included in the new legislation on media so that this struggle can be transferred to the Internet as well.
"In addition to our TV channels, we record, monitor, and analyze russian propaganda channels. Also, from the first day, we were engaged in turning them off in Europe and the world. The most common example is the ban of ‘russia today’ and ‘sputnik’ immediately in the first days of the war. But you must understand that there are about 20 TV channels, and this is only 2. And now, after 4 months of the war, 3 more TV channels have been added to the sixth sanctions package. We write, decipher, analyze, translate and send all this analysis of fakes, misinformation, and threats to European countries to our colleagues, European regulators, and governments of European countries so that they turn off more and more russian TV channels on European satellites." Maksym Onoprienko said.\
Valentyna Troian, a representative of the "Institute of Mass Information", notes that she has noticed a trend in the local media of Donetsk and Luhansk regions and their somewhat greater readiness for a full-scale invasion. In particular, some newsrooms were able to take their equipment and employees to the controlled territory in advance. But there were also publications that, due to various circumstances, they did not have time to take out the equipment and lost their material and technical base.
"The majority of the media, which did not focus on their technical characteristics and technology, which prioritized informing in any way, they worked on Telegram, Facebook – whatever is the most accessible and fastest way to transmit information," Valentyna Troian said.
Some newsrooms, based on the experience of 2014, determined the moment for themselves when it is necessary to act, in particular, to remove the equipment.
"In 2014, I worked at the Luhansk Regional State Broadcasting Company. And this was a real problem, because, for example, on May 9, we were already occupied. We went to work, our management did not explain what was happening. We saw armed men, but our managers did not see this as a problem. This time this did not happen with my colleagues, who then in 201 resumed this broadcasting in Severodonetsk," Valentyna Troian said.
Another problem, according to the expert, is the fact that the employees of some editorial offices are geographically scattered after the forced relocation. A positive trend for those media that work with grants was the reaction of the grantors, who gave the opportunity to reformat the work in any new format, in particular, to open completely new projects with new areas of work on the basis of editorial offices.
"In general, Luhansk and Donetsk regions reacted more promptly, I think. Let's agree that Zaporizhzhia did not expect this to happen. And Kharkiv region, probably, did not, too. And Kherson region. I don't know, maybe Kherson region felt some kind of threat from Crimea, but, for example, they came to the Suspilne branch there and kidnapped their engineer. I cannot say that there was no evacuation, we are adults – but for various reasons people could not evacuate. I just know that my colleagues in Luhansk region felt this threat, they knew what would happen if they found themselves under occupation," Valentyna Troian said.
According to her, no editorial office is physically present in the occupied territory. Because, first of all, it is dangerous, second, it makes no sense.
In addition, the occupiers put pressure on journalists even before the occupation. For example, they published the personal data of journalists on their junk sites, effectively announcing a hunt for them. Or threats to journalists from anonymous people were sent en masse in social networks, and then letters from rosnadzor about blocking.
"We have figures of 8 dead journalists in Ukraine, not only in the occupied territories. They died while performing their journalistic duties. And another 25 representatives of the media were killed while not performing their work – either they fought, or they simply died as people, as citizens, in their houses under fire. And separately, as of June 24, we recorded 21 cases when media representatives came under fire," Valentyna Troian said.
According to her, the occupiers failed to create or restore local media. This is also related to the complex technical component and logistics, as well as the lack of personnel.
"I want to emphasize, and I checked this information today with the Security Service of Ukraine, that in the Luhansk and Donetsk regions they did not record the facts of the cooperation of the media or individual journalists after February 24. I double-checked , because I didn't record it either, although I talk to people there and ask at least about cases without naming names – no, no one talks about it. There have been no such cases yet. This does not mean that it will not happen, because I am sure that not all journalists will be able to leave. They may be forced. I know people with whom I worked in Luhansk in 2014, they did not hide and they continue to say that they are pro-Ukrainian, they are not pro-Russian, but they worked on a hijacked TV channel when it was already obvious that it had been hijacked by collaborators, that it was run by russians. They went to work because of the money. I will not judge how ethical it is, why the person did not relocate, why they joined, but I assume that such cases may also occur in the territories russians seized after February 24," Valentyna Troian said.
The expert notes that in the territories occupied since 2014, occupiers’ local media have been established in 8 years, but there is also a lack of personnel there. This was felt both in 2014, when journalists went en masse to the controlled territory, and now, when media representatives are also subject to this illegal forced mobilization by russia. It is worth noting that people receive very little money for cooperation with collaborators there.
In her opinion, the state of Ukraine must, first of all, find out which journalists remain in the occupied territories and cannot leave due to the fact that they have no money or have certain family circumstances, for example, sick parents. The authorities must contact them and physically help them to leave, provide them with housing. After all, some journalists, in particular, left the profession because they are forced to live in the occupied territories. Second, it is necessary to help with technology. Third, we must have a plan for when these territories are de-occupied on how to prevent re-occupation, how to develop media immunity so that we know how to counter russian propaganda.