Andriy Solomka

Affiliated media: TV company Pryamiy, Journalist

Incident date: March 29, 2023

Attack type:

• Non-fatal attack / beating / injury / torture

Who attacked: Non-authorities

Source: Committee to Protect Journalists

Location: Ukraine, Kyiv Oblast, Kyiv

Additional information:

On March 29, worshippers at the state-run Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra monastery in Kyiv threatened and obstructed a group of journalists who had arrived there to cover the government’s termination of the monastery’s lease to the Ukrainian Orthodox Church. The believers surrounded the reporter of the private TV channel Pryamiy Andriy Solomka and his fellow cameraman Anton Puzan shortly after their arrival. Several people pushed the journalists and prevented them from doing their work. The next day, the priest, whose name was not given, grabbed the camera of the cameraman of the public TV company Suspilne Viktor Mozgovoy and snatched the microphone from him. The priest also slapped the shoulder of the correspondent of Suspilne Darya Nematyan Zolbin, when she tried to ask questions to the abbot of the monastery, Metropolitan Pavlo. Metropolitan Pavlo also pushed away the microphone of the reporter of the private company Espreso TV Valeria Pashko, when she tried to ask him a question.