TV channel NewsOne received warning over fake story about hearing in US Congress

The National Council on Television and Radio Broadcasting imposed on the TV channel ‘NewsOne’ (LLC “Novyny 24 Hodyny”) the sanction “issuing a warning”. The National Council adopted this decision at a session on December 21, its website reports. The warning was issued based on the results of two unscheduled inspections of the channel, which were conducted after it became known that the channel violated the requirements of Article 4 of the Rules of TV and Radio Broadcasting on days of mourning and remembrance days and presented biased information about the US Congressional Committee on Financial Issues discussing corruption in the National Bank of Ukraine. Namely, in the channel’s broadcast the National Council recorded violations on October 21, the day of the 70^th anniversary of the punitive operation ‘Zakhid’ by the Soviet repressive agencies – the mass deportation of the population of Western Ukraine to Siberia, and on October 27  – the day of the 80^th anniversary of the mass shooting of Ukrainian intelligentsia in the forest of Sandarmokh. Another violation was recorded on September 25, when the channel’s news program three times in one evening had a story about the ‘US Congressional Committee on Financial Issues’ hearing the issue of corruption in the National Bank of Ukraine (NBU). During a live standup from Washington subtitled ‘Exclusive’, the TV channel’s correspondent Daria Zarevna stated that she was standing in front of the Capitol, where the US Congressional Committee on Financial Issues was holding a session on investigation of corrupt actions by Valeria Hontariova during her tenure as the NBU head. On September 29, the American website “The Weekly Standard” published an article saying than there was no Congressional hearing about corruption in NBU. The inspection found that neither the correspondent nor other staff of LLC “Novyny 24 Hodyny” cheched the information as to its accuracy. In doing so, the TV channel violated regulations in sections a) and c) of Part 1 Article 59 of the Law of Ukraine “On Television and Radio broadcasting” (a TV and radio broadcaster is obligated to observe the legislation of Ukraine and its licensing conditions; to present unbiased information).