Tomenko asks UNIAN to explain why it manipulates the news

Tomenko also demanded the UNIAN chiefs to properly respond to this fact, because it is not about censorship, but about manipulation and propaganda – the techniques that, according to the polician, are widely used in totalitarian regimes.

"It is a manipulative technique, because a number of media, characterized by sympathy for the government, actively reprinted and disseminated these, as it turned out, fictional statements" - said Mykola Tomenko.

He also said that if necessary, the situation will be considered by the Committee on Freedom of Speech and Information.

"We know that there has been a difficult situation in UNIAN, a number of reputed journalists quitted the news agency, but now the situation is even more complicated, because of it misleads people and undermines the credibility of the news agency that used to be respected," - said Tomenko.

He recalled that for the last months this is the second such case in Ukraine, when false information was spread. In particular, recently he, as chairman of the Committee, received a statement from the leadership of Vysoky Zamok newspaper, who reported that Obozrevatel web-site reprinted its interview with the additions which were absent in the original source. Journalists noted that some answers of the opposition were forged, and therefore called it a "manipulative political technology."

As IMI reported earlier, Batkivschyna political party announced that the web site of UNIAN news agency, on February 11, 2013, posted falsified statements of MPs Alexandra Kuzhel and Sergey Vlasenko. In particular, the information circulated on behalf of Vlasenko, about attempts of poisoning and spying on him, and the statement of Kuzhel "I can be jailed for 10 years," were partially falsified.