Since the beginning of the year, 173 violations of freedom of press were registered (updated) - IMI

In eight months of 2017, IMI registered on the territory of Ukraine 173 cases of violations of the freedom of press. For comparison, last year in the same period, 184 cases were registered. These are the results of the monthly monitoring of the Institute of Mass Information “Freedom of press barometer”. The top three types of violations are obstruction to journalist activities, limitation of access to public information, threats and intimidation of journalists. The largest number of violations for eight months of 2017 were registered in the category “impediment to lawful professional activities of journalists” - 54 cases (for the same period of the previous year - 71 cases). Just as before, IMI experts register reduction in cases of physical aggression against journalists in Ukraine. Cases from category “beatings and assaults” were fourth most prevalent (18 cases). In 2016, in the same period there were 24 cases of beatings. At the same time, since the beginning of the year, there was a registered increase in cases of limitation of access to information and threats to journalists. In particular, IMI experts registered 23 cases of limitation of access to information (this category was the second most prevalent). In the same period of the previous year, 18 such violations were registered. This year, threats is the third most prevalent violation - 21 cases (for the same period of the previous year, threats were on the second place, with 32 cases). In addition, a the number of cases of damaging journalists'  property  increased: since the beginning of the year, 11 cases were registered, compared to the previous year, when only 3 such violations were registered. Top five regions with highest number of registered violations this year are: Kyiv with its oblast (38 cases), Mykolaiv region (17 cases), Volyn (15 cases), Poltava region(12 cases) and Odesa region (11 cases). The aggressors who were violating journalists' rights were: private individuals - 95, local authorities - 27, police, intelligence and military officers - 14 cases. In Separate Regions of Donetska and Luhanska oblasts, 2 known cases were registered since the beginning of the year (three - last year), in Crimea occupied by Russia  - 8 cases (last year - 29).   In more detail, you can read about the state of freedom of press on the IMI website in the section “Barometer of freedom of press”. The Institute of Mass Information conducts a monthly all-Ukrainian monitoring of freedom of press according to the following categories: physical aggression, censorship and access to information, economic and political pressure, legal pressure and cybercrime against media outlets and journalists. The monthly report includes only the cases related to freedom of press and professional journalist activity. The methodology is outlined here.The monitoring is conducted with support of the program U-Media Internews Network and NED, and is also enabled by the Media Development Foundation under the Embassy of USA, which supports the regional network of IMI.