"Reporters Without Borders" concerned over disappearance of Stas Aseyev and demand his immediate release

The international advocacy organization “Reporters Without Borders” is deeply concerned over disappearance of Donetsk-based journalist Stanislav Aseyev and calls for his immediate release. This is the organization’s statement it shared with ІМІ.

““Stanislav Aseyev’s situation is extremely worrying,” RSF said. “We hold the DPR’s self-proclaimed authorities responsible for his fate and for his safety. And we urge all of the region’s political actors, including the international organizations that have a presence there, to help obtain his immediate release.”

The organization points out that as well as being lawless, the separatist-controlled, pro-Russian territories in Eastern Ukraine are also in the process of becoming news and information “black holes” to which critical journalists and foreign observers are now rarely admitted.

Currently, Ukraine ranks 102^nd in the Reporters Without Borders’ World Press Freedom Index and continues to be the scene of an “information war” with Russia, the organization admits.

As IMI has reported earlier, on June 12 Radio Liberty called for release of the Radio Liberty blogger and contributor Stanislav Vasin (Aseyev), who disappeared in Donetsk in June.

On June 6 the former MP Yehor Firsov on his Facebook page informed that journalist Stanislav Vasin went missing in the occupied Donetsk.

Radio Liberty lost contact with Vasin on June 2. Stanislav last contacted his mother in the lunchtime on June 2.

On June 8, police launched an investigation of the disappearance of journalist Stanislav Vasin.

On June 11, the Security Service of Ukraine confirmed disappearance of Vasin in Donetsk.

Stanislav Vasin, who was captured by the “DPR” militants, is in fact journalist, essayist and writer Stas  Aseyev, and Vasin is his pen-name.

Stanislav Vasin contributed to the Radio Liberty project “Donbas. Realii”, “Ukrainskyi Tyzhden”, “Ukrainska Pravda”, “Dzerkalo Tyzhnia”.