Maidan / Maidan News

Ukrainian Site

28-11-2004 02:52 Maidan-INFORM
Voices Wailing in the Russian Information Desert

Print version // Edit // Delete // URL: http://maidan.org.ua/static/enews/1101603135.html

Voices wailing in the Russian information desert.


Tonight Russian TV channel TVC, obedient to Moscow Mayor Luzhkov, cited Western treacheries as reason for Ukrainian political crisis. Hundreds of thousands of people that spend their days on Maidan, Kyiv’s main Independence Square, people that come here for hours in a row, that walk in Khreshchatyk in unbelievable jams, - that, by the appraisal of the program “Post scriptum”, is a “well-organized crowd”. Anything but a people conscious of its own self-respect.

Moreover, TVC is giving voice to the crisis deepening scenario desirable for Russian authorities – scenario that implies interference in Ukrainian internal affairs: “We shouldn’t shy away from it – even at the cost of our friendship with EU and USA, even at the cost of Ukraine’s territorial integrity”.

And where is Russia’s intelligentsia? What is its civic stand? Where are the demands that media provide well-balanced information?

So far we only hear from some lone voices of Moscow’s, St. Petersburg’s and Sochi’s intellectual elite.

Why Sochi? Finally I saw the Russian tri-color on Maidan. Talking to the guy around 50 years old carrying the flag:

- Where are you from?
- Sochi. My name is Veniamin Sporevoy.
- Why did you decide to come to Kiev?
- Because I’m ashamed of Putin.
- Meaning?
- Well, events that happened in Ukraine didn’t happen without his participation. And our TV channels can’t be trusted. We don’t have the unbiased information about the orange revolution.

Similar idea has been expressed by the well-known Russian sociologist Anna Andreyenkova, who has represented the famous Levada Center when in charge of the National exit poll’2004. She has sent the following letter to the ‘Democratic Initiatives’ fund:

“Dear colleagues! We have returned to Moscow, we’re conducting our routine polls, but our thoughts are in Kiev with you. The only TV station I watch is “Euronews”, the only radio station I listen to is “Moscow’s Echo” – the ones that provide more or less unbiased information about what’s happening. The rest of the stations only try to cover everything up. It’s especially hard to witness this after our return from the orange Kiev, and the only things shown on TV are the blue rallies.

I feel like running outside and screaming “Guys! It’s not true, don’t believe it!”

I’ve never been so ashamed of Russia!”

Vitaliy Dovhych.

Print version // Edit // Delete // URL: http://maidan.org.ua/static/enews/1101603135.html