Chief editor of "Strana.ua" went to Austria and requested political asylum there

Chief editor of online media outlet “Strana.ua”, Ihor Huzhva, left the territory of Ukraine and requested political asylum in Austria. Ihor Huzhva himself published an address to readers in the media outlet “Strana.ua”, “Detector media” reports. The message emphasized that he left the country after the court restriction on his travels expired, and thus did not break the law. The media outlet also reported that Huzhva remains the chief editor and will continue to administrate the "Strana.ua" from abroad. Huzhva complains about pressure of the authorities, in particular, he mentions that five criminal cases were opened against him by Ukrainian law enforcement agencies. Also he complained about receiving threats and failure of the police to respond to this properly. As IMI reported before, on June 22, 2017, law enforcement agencies detained chief editor of “Strana.ua” Ihor Huzhva, as a suspect for extortion of 10 thousand dollar bribe for not publishing compromising materials about the member of parliament, Dmytro Liashko. Right before that, the office of the media outlet was searched by SBU.