Recently the mass media raised an uproar over the accreditation of Lilia Budzhurova, a correspondent with the STB television channel and Agence France-Presse, at the Ukraine-EU summit. As this author has learned and as was witnessed by many journalists who worked in Simferopol covering President Kuchma’s visit, prior to his arrival at a construction site for the ceremony sealing a memorial capsule into the cornerstone of what will become the only Ukrainian gymnasium on the peninsula, Presidential Press Secretary Olena Hromnytska insisted that Lilia Budzhurova not ask the president a question about the dam the Russians are building in the Kerch Strait (the dam is to connect a part of Ukraine’s territory, the Tuzla Spit, with Russia’s Taman Peninsula, which Ukraine believes to be a violation of the two countries’ laws in force). On her part, Lilia Budzhurova considered it her professional duty to ask this question when Pres. Kuchma was talking with journalists and did so, while her colleagues picked it up. (Her question was, “Leonid Danylovych, [do you think] the tense situation in the Kerch Strait might produce a border conflict,” to which the president answered, “...I would never believe this is possible... I think we will be able to settle the problem... Let’s view it as a misunderstanding which will be solved rapidly.”). According to Lilia Budzhurova, despite the awkward situation the president did not refuse to talk to the journalists and was heard telling Olena Hromnytska: “I’m not afraid of political questions.” Everybody agreed that he answered the journalists’ questions with dignity and as befitted the situation. However, on that same night Ms. Budzhurova, already accredited to the Ukraine-EU summit, was transferred from the main pool of journalists that were to work in the Livadiya Palace to a group of journalists in the press center set up in the Yalta Hotel. It is especially distressing that this incident happened during the Ukraine-EU summit. Incidentally, freedom of the press is a sore point in the talks between Brussels and official Kyiv. The Crimean Association of Free Journalists seized on this conflict to criticize the presidential press service and the press secretary in particular for “preventing journalists from carrying out their professional duties.” Lilia Budzhurova offered her own account of the incident.
What caused the conflict with the presidential press secretary and how did the events unfold?
“I have already said that the situation as a result of which I was deprived of the possibility to cover the Ukraine-EU Summit is absurd: this journalist has had her accreditation cancelled for performing her professional duties, that is, for asking the president to comment on an event of utmost importance for Ukraine, since the situation in the strait was nothing short of a violation of Ukraine’s sovereignty. It was naХve of the presidential press secretary to assume that, knowing this, the journalists would not attempt to ask the head of state for comment. Long before the president arrived at the construction site, the journalists asked a representative of the presidential press service whether an interview was planned. We were told that the program of the visit did not envision one. Then we said that we would just the same try to ask the president the question about the main, in our view, event of these days. Initially, they reacted quite calmly, but Olena Hromnytska passed on to me a request not to ask this question. Later still, I received a call from Ms. Hromnytska herself, who took great pains to convince me that I should not ask the president about the Tuzla Spit. She explained that ‘this was not your level,’ that the Foreign Ministry is addressing this problem, and that Pres. Kuchma is not ready yet to comment on this. However, this was not the case, as the president frankly answered our questions and showed an adequate assessment of the situation. Then I told Hromnytska: ‘Let the Foreign Ministry do its job, you do yours, and I’ll do mine. It’s up to me as a journalist to ask questions about an event that worries everybody, and your assignment is, if need be, to make sure the president is prepared to answer it.’ Mr. Kuchma, on hearing that the journalists wished to talk, approached us despite his secretary’s attempt to stand in his way. Moving Hromnytska’s hand aside he told her: ‘I’m not afraid of political questions.’ We all heard this. Meanwhile, something inconceivable happened that evening. The presidential press secretary canceled my accreditation. Serhiy Dovbeshko, a representative of the Foreign Ministry Press Service in Yalta, told me on the phone that in the list signed by Hromnytska my last name had been replaced with that of a different journalist and that he would cover the main events of the summit instead.”
But Olena Hromnytska told a few agencies that your accreditation had not been cancelled.
“Hromnytska’s commentary reveals the fact that our press services are very inventive when they need to prevent unwelcome journalists from accessing information sources. She said that the STB channel accredited two journalists for the summit, but she didn’t mention the fact that the second journalist, Serhiy Syrovatka, was accredited only after she told the STB management that I was persona non grata at the summit.
“Second, while she said that I in fact had a chance to cover the summit, I must say that if Hromnytska believes that a journalist can cover the summit from the press center, which, aside from journalists, is open to any Yalta resident who can also follow the summit watching televised broadcasts, I don’t think so. As a professional I see my work differently. The journalist should be able to attend the event he’s writing about. How else can he write about it? The journalist should be able to ask the participants any question that might interest his viewers, listeners, readers, and not the question Hromnytska finds most appropriate. And, of course, the journalist’s work can be considered normal only when nobody forbids him to ask a question that somebody might not like. Meanwhile, I could just as well watch the televised broadcasts from all the meetings as part of the summit at home and not travel all the way to Yalta. If you assess the journalist’s work the way Hromnytska does, it would appear that all Yalta residents or all Crimeans can be considered accredited to cover the summit, since they are also ‘not far’ from the event and can follow it on television.
“Accreditation is about ensuring the right to work. Meanwhile, instead of the right to work I was offered the right to watch television. I think that journalists of all publications, channels, and other mass media that have been barred from the sources of information at the summit should ask the press services of all state bodies: can access to a television set on the sixteenth floor of the Yalta Hotel be considered accreditation for the summit underway in the Crimea? Or are only those journalists who have been granted access to the Livadiya Palace really accredited? Meanwhile, they are carefully screened by the press service, with the remaining journalists receiving only an imitation of accreditation. The right to watch UT-1 television on the sixteenth floor of the Yalta Hotel is no accreditation. It is a camouflaged move to prevent journalists from performing their professional duties. Since to write for a newspaper, agency, or television channel based on what you have seen on television along with millions of viewers is not a quite adequate performance of one’s professional duties. Don’t you think so, dear colleagues? How long will the press services treat us like this and divide journalists into whites and blacks?”
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On her part, Olena Hromnytska said that nobody knocked Lilia Budzhurova off the list of journalists accredited to the summit. Her last name is included in all lists along with another STB journalist. Simultaneously, Mrs. Hromnytska explained that certain pools were foreseen for the summit, that is, accreditation means participation in the event in the Livadiya Palace, work in the press center, etc. “Who attends what events is up to the editors. For example, the STB channel sent two journalists to cover this event, Budzhurova included. It’s up to them to decide who goes where and who covers what events,” stressed Mrs. Hromnytska, adding that the decision on who works in what format depends on “their editorial policy.” According to the press secretary, Lilia Budzhurova’s last name was included in all lists of journalists who had been granted access to the press center, which aired live broadcasts from all meetings held as part of the summit. Simultaneously, Mrs. Hromnytska stressed that the number of journalists who had been allowed to attend the event was limited for technical reasons, since the halls of the Livadiya Palace cannot accommodate over seventy persons. As for the October 6 incident, Mrs. Hromnytska stressed that all public events involving the head of state follow a certain protocol. Meanwhile, at the moment when Lilia Budzhurova attempted to ask the president a question no interview was planned.
FROM THE EDITORS. It is not at all worthwhile to treat this situation as an isolated case. That the press services do not encourage high officials’ contacts with the press and, on the contrary, often protect them from media attention and screen journalists, is a problem that needs to be widely discussed. After all, if state functionaries really intend to pursue the political course toward integration with the EU that has been mapped out by the president, then obviously they must adhere to the civilized practice of working hand in hand with the mass media.
