Luhansk People’s Republic shut down IRTA TV channel

On May 30, on a press conference Valeriy Bolotov, the head of the so-called Luhansk People’s Republic made a statement that the local TV channel IRTA, connected with Volodymyr Landyk, the ex-MP from the Party of Regions, is shut down because it was acting as a propaganda tool for the criminal Kyiv regime. He also said that the TV channel’s staff would be hired in the newly formed media holding of Luhansk People’s Republic. Currently, a Russian TV channel LIFENEWS is broadcasting on IRTA’s frequency.

According to one of IRTA’s top managers, a couple of days ago armed representatives of Luhansk People’s Republic came to them and forced them to terminate their own broadcasting and to broadcast LIFENEWS instead. Earlier, the IRTA management sent all staff on a two-week vacation, but on May 30 under a threat to their lives, several journalists had to return to work to cover activities of Luhansk People’s Republic.

In March 2014, pro-Russian activists tried to take over IRTA because it was showing in its special report the actual situation in Luhansk – that a group of provocateurs with Russian flags was taking over the oblast state administration and attacking regular local residents. On April 7, more than a dozen unidentified men tried to break into the channel’s office, and three guards sustained injuries.