In Odesa, city council in front of mayor and councilmembers, unidentified men attacked journalist

On June 13, in Odesa on a session of the coordinating council, which was held in the city council premises, unidentified men in camouflage uniforms attacked the freelance correspondent of the media outlet “Izbirkom” Yuriy Diachenko. This was reported by “Izbirkom”.

According to the journalist, after he started filming the session, he was approached by unidentified men who did not introduce themselves and began demanding that the journalist switch off the video recording.

Somewhat later, several men of athletic built in camouflage uniforms with no insignia attacked Yuriy Diachenko and pulled him out of the assembly hall. All this was taking place in front of the city mayor Hennadiy Trukhanov, local councilmembers and other journalists. 

Also, these men took away his personal belonging and his cell phone. They did return his phone later, but all the earlier videos he had recorded were deleted.

As the media outlet reports, the city mayor Hennadiy Trukhanov, who presided over the session of the coordinating council, said that it was “a regular session”, where video should not be filmed. He explained that he allows “to be present and ask questions”, but “there should be no filming”, as allegedly activists “turn councilmembers and officials into clowns”.

On the same day, Yuriy Diachenko filed a complaint to the law enforcement agencies about obstruction to journalist activities.