Former journalist on the “Unified Telethon”: “European Solidarity” is under a complete ban

The “United News” telethon is total censorship, a ban on criticism of the government and opposition speakers.

Journalist Evgeny Lesnoy wrote about this in his article “Personal experience of working in the “Unified News” telethon” for the “Detector Media” website .

“This text is exclusively about my personal experience of working within the framework of the telethon “Edinye Novosti”. Experience lasting a year and a half. Since when leaving the TV channel I signed non-disclosure documents – financial and other information that could damage the reputation of the media – I will not talk about the channel itself. What is happening on other Ukrainian TV channels that produce content for the marathon at state expense,” the journalist noted.

“At first, nothing caused concern. The position was clear: I was not asked to film openly pro-government stories. I invited the speakers myself – from my own circle of professional contacts. But then it became more complicated. The editor-in-chief of the news broadcast constantly asked who exactly I was planning to film. “Advice”: it is worth “playing by the rules”. Like, I periodically film the lawyer Yaroslav Kuts – and he is, I quote, “Poroshenko’s”.

“It is clear that the topic of “European Solidarity” is completely forbidden. Both the director and the editor-in-chief told me this clearly: “They have their own TV channels – you can’t come here.” But I ignored these prohibitions. I periodically filmed both Kuts and political scientist Yevgeny Magda. However, every appearance by the editors became a routine occurrence. By the way, all conversations in my editorial office took place exclusively in Russian,” he also noted.

“The marathon does not welcome any speakers who criticize the government. Information producers constantly asked the editor-in-chief: is it possible to take a comment from a certain expert. And the answer did not come immediately – because the approval came “from above”. A journalist always has ways to convey the important – through the speaker’s comments.” depersonalization – journalism loses its meaning. This is called in one word: censorship,” the journalist emphasized.