Ukraine: Union of Orthodox Journalists Office Raided by Secret Services

In a shock and another blow to freedom of the press in Ukraine, the Union of Orthodox Journalists offices in Ukraine have been raided by Secret Services of Ukraine (the SBU) yesterday, March 12. We have occasionally cited news from UOJ concerning matters related to the war in Ukraine as well as news of the Moscow Patriarchate and other regional religious news. To see that the Ukrainian government is actually raiding the offices of legitimate journalists of long-standing is shocking.

According to the UOJ article here detailing what occurred, cell phones and computers were seized, but there were no charges pressed as of the time of publication.

The raid comes less than two months after Chilean-American blogger Gonzalo Lira was reported to have died in a Ukrainian prison cell after being arrested for pro-Russian political views last year. Clearly the “Western values” the Zelensky administration refers don’t seem to include freedom of the press, which it has been harshly ramping down on (at least officially) since 2021.

From our perspective, it’s starting to look like “anything the current regime doesn’t like is Russian propaganda.”