It’s published
According to media organizations, a Ukrainian from Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) was released on Sunday after being detained by Russian authorities for more than four years.
VladySlav Yesypenko was arrested and imprisoned in Crimea on March 10, 2021. This was illegally annexed by Russia in 2014.
Yesypenko was charged with Ukrainian spying (accusations he denied), and a court established by Russia on the territory was sentenced to six years in prison in February 2022, but his sentence was later reduced to five years.
Not only was it rejected by Yesypenko himself, but RFE/RL and rights groups say the charges were manufactured. Yesypenko was later charged with possession of an explosive, which he denied, but prosecutors later admitted that the hand-ren bullet found in his car had no fingerprints.
Yesypenko, a Dual Russia and Ukrainian citizen, testified at his trial that he was tortured electrocuted and electrocuted to elicit a false confession.
“For over four years, Vlad was deliberately punished by arbitrarily for the crimes he committed. He paid a price that was too high to report the truth about what was happening within Russia’s occupied Crimea,” said Stephen Capus, CEO of RFE/RL. He added that Yesypenko was “torturing physically and psychologically.”
Yesypenko was released after RFE/RL correspondent Ihar Karnei was released from Inverals prison after a visit from a senior US official. Calnei was arrested in 2023 and sentenced to three years in prison on charges of “extremism” that he denied.
Kapus said, “We thanked the US and the Ukrainian government for working with us to ensure that Vlad’s unfair detention would not be extended. Andri Yamak, aide to the Ukrainian president, also thanked everyone who freed yesypenko.
Crimean media freedom has deteriorated since Russia’s illegal annexation of Crimea. According to Ukrainian Human Rights NGO Zmina, 88% of media active by 2014 had stopped operating by 2015.
According to Pen America, Yesipunko had collected footage for reports presented by Crimean residents talking about how their lives have changed for years since Russia annexed the peninsula.
Authorities also stepped up the crackdown on opposition within Russia since Moscow began a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. In April, a Russian court convicted four journalists of “extremism,” each sentenced over five years.
They all said they were being charged with maintaining their innocence and doing their job as journalists.
Additional sources •AP
