Ukraine's Security Service chief says situation with draft notice for journalist will be addressed

KATERYNA TYSHCHENKO — Saturday, 6 April 2024, 16:39

Vasyl Maliuk (left) and Yaroslav Yurchyshyn (right), Photo: Yurchyshyn on Facebook

Yaroslav Yurchyshyn, Chairman of the Ukrainian Parliament's Committee on Freedom of Speech, has held a meeting with Vasyl Maliuk, Chief of the Security Service of Ukraine (SSU), to discuss the situation regarding the attempt to serve a military draft notice on Yevhenii Shulhat, a journalist with Slidstvo.info, an investigative news outlet.

Source: Yurchyshyn on Facebook

Quote: "I have met with the head of the Security Service of Ukraine in hot pursuit. We discussed cooperation in combating Russian disinformation, assistance to the nations enslaved by Russia, and interaction with social media to strengthen our information security. I expressed my gratitude to him for his contribution to the armed response to the aggressor.

I emphasised the unacceptability of the actions and behaviour of individual employees. The Chief (Maliuk) made it clear that this situation would not be ignored."

Details: Answering a clarifying question in the comments to the post, whether the situation with the attempt to serve a draft notice on an investigative journalist was discussed during the meeting, Yurchyshyn replied that this was exactly what was mentioned in the last sentence of his post.

Background:

On Saturday, the investigative journalism agency Slidstvo.Info released a story stating that on 1 April, employees of a territorial centre for recruitment (TCR, or military enlistment office) approached Slidstvo.Info journalist Yevhenii Shulhat in the Obolonskyi district of Kyiv and attempted to serve him with a military draft notice.
It was Shulhat who worked on the investigation into the activities of Illia Vitiuk, Head of the Cyber-Security Department at the Security Service of Ukraine, which was released on 4 April.
Slidstvo.info found out that the TCR representatives who tried to serve the summons were likely accompanied by Oleksii Bilenko, who works in the SSU's Cybersecurity Department and is close to Vitiuk.

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