In Kyiv, unknown perpetrators use smoke flares to disrupt screening of Open Access

Kyiv. On September 27, unknown perpetrators tried to disrupt the screening  of the documentary almanac “Open Access”, scheduled to begin at 7 p.m. at the Kinopanorama cinema theatre. 

Before the screening started, someone brought to the cinema hall a group of 30 persons who looked like they were homeless. The group was accompanied by two men in Berkut uniform.

These unknown people occupied the two first rows in the hall. Some of them were drunk, some were smoking right there, some were yelling: "Where's the movie?", “There will be no movie.”

These people had simple printed badges that read "Press", «Maidan», or «Correspondent».

The police was called to the site. Two police officers arrived and started to escort the "homeless journalists" out. In the process of this, someone threw the smoke flares in the hall.

The screening  was stopped and resumed only after 8 p.m.

Around 9 p.m. the Ukrainska Pravda journalist  Sergiy Leshchenko wrote on Facebook about another provocation: the police received a call that a bomb was planted in the building and so the explosion lab experts arrived to the scene. So, the screening was stopped.

For the context, in Cherkasy on 25 September during the screening of the almanac "Open Access" there was a blackout in the building.

In Brovary, the local authorities started the reconstruction works in the park where the event was taking place.

On June 22, in Feodosia there were also attempts to disrupt the screening of the almanac "Open Access", which was scheduled for June 24.

On June 21, at the screening of the almanac in Sevastopol electricity was cut off.

On June 20, in Simferopol a smoke flare was thrown under the doors of the hall, where the screening was held.

On June 17, the Mykolayiv cinema theatre «Multipleks» refused to rent the hall for screening of the documentary .

A similar situation with the screening of «Open Access» took place in Odesa, when this April the club «Coworking Space» first agreed to provide the room for the screening but later withdrew, explaining that the film is about politics.

In Donetsk, right before the beginning of the screening in the cinema theatre «Kinokult» electricity was cut off, as the director claimed that there was a blackout in the entire district, although the lights in the houses around it were still on.

The almanac «Open Access» consists of five stories "Mezhygiria", "Afghanistan Veteran", "School", "House with Chimeras", and "In the Corner."