Involved in hybrid war? Kremlin-backed news office searched, chief detained in Kyiv

Kirill Vyshinsky, Chief of RIA Novosti-Ukraine, was detained in Kyiv on Tuesday morning.

“Employees of the Security Service of Ukraine, together with the Prosecutor’s Office of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea, have disclosed the activities of a network of media structures controlled by the Russian Federation and conducting investigative actions in the office of RIA Novosti-Ukraine in Kyiv,” Interfax Ukraine reports.

The media outlet might have been used by the aggressor country in the context of a hybrid information war against Ukraine, spokeswoman of the SBU Olena Hitlianska said.

According to her, investigative actions are being carried out, searches are taking place in the office of RIA Novosti-Ukraine located in downtown Kyiv.

Moscow will retaliate against steps of Ukraine’s Security Service against Russian media outlets, and will act persistently when defending the interests of journalists, Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Tuesday.

RIA Novosti-Ukraine was established in the 2000s as part of the self-named Russian news agency. Later it merged into the Russia Today media group. In 2014, Kirill Vyshinsky was awarded the Russian medal “For Services to the Fatherland for ‘the unbiased coverage of events in Crimea’.

Belsat.eu