On February 2, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky implemented a Ukrainian National Security and Defense Council recommendation to sanction parliamentary deputy Taras Kozak.
Kozak, a member of Ukraine’s pro-Russian Opposition Platform For Life party (OPZZh), is closely allied with oligarch and fellow OPZZh deputy Viktor Medvedchuk, who is .
The decision to sanction Kozak was taken mainly due to the discovery that he has financial ties to the self-proclaimed Donetsk and Luhansk “People’s Republics,” Russia’s proxy states in eastern Ukraine, where casualty counts continue to rise in an ongoing war incited by Moscow. In addition, some of Kozak’s television channels helped in Rostov-na-Donu, Russia, that traded in coal produced in the occupied areas of Ukraine.
The sanctions, initially set to last for five years, restrict Kozak from various financial transactions and flights within Ukraine. But their biggest impact is on Kozak’s media holdings. He owns three major TV channels in Ukraine -- 112 Ukraine, Zik, and Newsone.
All three channels following Zelensky’s order.
“Ukraine strongly supports freedom of speech, but not propaganda financed by the aggressor against our country,” Zelensky said in .
The U.S. Embassy in Kyiv voiced its , tweeting:
“The US supports (Ukraine’s) efforts yesterday to counter Russia’s malign influence, in line with (Ukrainian) law, in defense of its sovereignty & territorial integrity. We must all work together to prevent disinformation from being deployed as a weapon in an info war against sovereign states.”
Predictably, Russia reacted negatively. In a press briefing on February 4, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova criticized the sanctions as a strike against free speech.
“We consider the deprivation of three Ukrainian media outlets with a solid audience by the decree of the head of state as a flagrant example of political censorship and unfair competition, contrary to the laws of Ukraine and Kyiv's international obligations to protect freedom of speech,” she said.
Zakharova’s claim is a misleading oversimplification, particularly given Russia’s own reputation for censorship, attacks on journalists and political repression.
Censorship in wartime is a common practice, and Ukraine is de facto at war with Russia, which has occupied the Crimean peninsula and helped set up military regimes in the two Eastern states. The fighting in eastern Ukraine’s Donbas region has claimed more than 13,000 lives and displaced nearly 2 million people.
In 2019, the Verkhovna Rada, Ukraine’s parliament, initiated an investigation into hostile . The investigation accused Kozak’s three channels of engaging in pro-Russian psychological operations by fomenting ethnic tension, sowing panic, demoralizing the military, and generally undermining Ukraine’s defense against Russian aggression.
Since the ban, a group of Ukrainian civil groups, including those related to media and press freedom, released supporting the president’s action.
“We, the representatives of Ukrainian civil society and expert community countering disinformation, insist that sanctions imposed on Taras Kozak, legal owner of TV-channels 112, ZIK and Newsone, and legal entities linked to him by the decree of President Volodymyr Zelensky on February 2, 2021 to implement the decision of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine, do not constitute an attack on the freedom of speech,” the statement read.
“These channels constitute tools of foreign influence operations, and therefore a systemic threat to information security of Ukraine for the following reasons.”
The statement cited allegations that Russia has funded the channels, and that they have consistently spread disinformation in support of Russia’s goals in the country, including support for proxy forces in Donbas. It also cited the stations’ lack of adherence to common journalistic ethics or standards.
The statement also noted that when Kozak took over ownership of the channel Zik in 2019, the tenor of coverage turned decidedly anti-Ukraine and many journalists and .
The Ukraine Crisis Media Centre released a more explaining the practices of these media outlets.
In July 2019, a report by the Commission on Journalism Ethics, Human Rights Platform, the Ukrainian Media and Communications Institute, and the Stopfake fact-checking site, found that Kozak’s 112 Ukraine and Newsone, among other channels, , without presenting alternative views.
