Detention of the journalist and editor of the Center of Investigative Reporting Natalya Kokorina became the pick-of-the-day on March 13. On the eve of this event the international human rights organization “Reporters without boarders” stated that one year after the Russian annexation of Crimea there are virtually no independent media left in the peninsula, and the ones that do exist, for example, the “CIR”, are attacked and their journalists are pursued. Christian Mir, the chief of the German department of “Reporters without boarders”, noted that possibility of critical approach to coverage of events is completely absent in Crimea.
FSB officers immediately proved these words. On March 13, around 8 am, a search was conducted in the apartment, where the CIR editor Natalya Kokorina was registered, without any explanations. As Natalya informed the colleagues, she was called and asked to arrive to her parents’ apartment: “In the morning a man who introduced himself as Kievskiy district police officer called me and said that door of the apartment, where I was registered and where my parents lived, had been broken. My parents’ phones were turned off.” When the journalist got to the scene, it turned out that FSB officers, who didn’t even let the lawyer Dzhemil Temishev to be present at the scene, were already conducting the search.
The lawyer noted that such actions violate requirements of the part 9, article 182 of the criminal procedure code of the Russian Federation “Grounds and procedures of conducting the search”. The lawyer was allowed to visit the detainee only by 2 pm.
After the search was over, Natalya Kokorina was taken by four FSB officers to the Crimean administration of the FSB of Russia in Simferopol.
Journalists that were waiting in front of the house of the editor followed her. The interrogation lasted for 6 hours and at the same time police officers of the Kievskiy district of Simferopol went beyond the law regarding the journalists – they were forbidden to film, they were asked to show their documents for inspection and their personal data was written down including official residential registration.
The administration of the FSB refused to comment on the events. “We do not comment,” the chief of the FSB press-service in Crimea Sergey Terekhov said.
At 6 pm of Kiev time, it was reported that Kokorina walked out the building of the FSB administration of Crimea together with her lawyer Dzhemil Temishev.
In the morning it also became known that the FSB conducted a search in parent’s apartment of Anna Andriyevskaya, the ex-editor, and author of articles for the “CIR”, who is in Kiev right now. “There is a criminal case opened against me because of materials on the “CIR” about volunteers of the battalion “Krym”. It seems like I am imputed appeals of overthrow of power in Crimea, however, I haven’t seen the document itself yet,” the journalist wrote on her page in Facebook having added that during the search her father’s PC was impounded.
The Ukrainian authorities reacted to these events in the annexed Crimea by a message in Twitter. Head of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs Pavel Klimkin wrote that Natalya Kokorina should be released: “Russia as an invader-state should stop suffocation of freedom of speech in Crimea. I am done.”
The OSCE representative in the matter of freedom of media Dunya Miyatovich also appealed to Crimean “authorities” for liberation of the journalist: “This detention is a reminder of continuing practice of the “authorities” of Crimea to intimidate and pursue representatives of the independent media. I appeal to the “authorities” in Crimea to release Kokorina immediately. Repressions against the free media and independent voices in Crimea are nothing else but fundamental violation of the basic human rights.”
Around 7 pm the Kokorina’s lawyer Dzhemil Temishev informed that the journalist was interrogated as a witness in a criminal case, opened according to the article 280.1 “The public appeal for actions aimed at violation of the territorial integrity of the Russian Federation”. According to the lawyer, it involves the article about the battalion “Krym”. Investigators impounded a laptop and some documents from the woman.
As a reminder, the article 280.1 came into action last May. Compulsory community services in a term up to 480 hours with disqualification to hold certain positions or to be engaged in certain activities in a term up to three years or imprisonment in a term up to 5 years are the punishment for its violation.
