"In the crosshairs of Zelensky's 'info-army'": Financial Times responds to pressure on journalists in Ukraine

The Financial Times has responded to the surveillance and intimidation of investigative journalists Yuriy Nikolov and the team of Bigus.info. In particular, the British newspaper published an article titled "Ukrainian media in the crosshairs of Zelensky's 'info army'" about the oppression of freedom of speech in Ukraine.

While journalists have previously been subjected to online intimidation and defamation campaigns, in recent days this has escalated into real-life persecution," the article says, mentioning the attack on Nikolov's apartment and surveillance of the Bigus.info team.

"Soon after, pro-government Telegram channels published photos of the attackers and accused them of having the blessing of a law enforcement agency," the FT notes.

In addition, the article emphasizes that the video from the cottage near Kyiv, where Bigus.info employees allegedly use drugs, appeared on the YouTube channel Narodna Pravda, which, according to Ukrainian fact-checkers, is headed by a woman whose image was generated by artificial intelligence.

"Narodna Pravda is similar in appearance and tactics to a 2013 project called Ukrainian Lies, which targeted prominent journalists and human rights activists who criticized then-prosecutor Viktor Yanukovych," the publication recalls.

Nikolov commented on the FT article, noting that he had not spoken to the author of the article, but warned that the persecution of Ukrainian journalists would not go unnoticed in the Western media.

"All this time, while the police were delaying the opening of the case and Zelensky was putting water in his mouth, I was saying that the biggest risk of this special operation was that it would be reported in the West. God forbid that a narrative should form that we treat journalists the same way as in Russia. To prevent the image of Ukraine as a small Russia, which means we don't need to help it, but should really leave it to Putin, since it is the same anyway," Nikolov emphasized.

On January 17, the Security Service of Ukraine announced that it was investigating the circumstances of the illegal wiretapping and video recording of representatives of the Bihus.Info project.

Background. As a reminder, on January 16, the little-known YouTube channel Narodna Pravda posted a video titled "The Downside of Bihus.info: Sniffing a Hairdryer, Dabbing MDMA, Smoking Weed, and Going to Investigate."

The 5-minute video featured recordings of phone conversations between Bihus.info editorial staff. In two conversations, young people discussed the purchase of illegal substances and their prices.

Separately, the video showed footage of a group of young people smoking something from small pipes near a wooden house, as well as three girls inside the room, inhaling a substance from a table. As it turned out later, the video was filmed on New Year's Eve during a corporate party for this publication, and the cameramen of Bihus.info appeared in the video.

The video was intensively distributed by anonymous telegram channels, and soon it received over a hundred thousand views, many times more than other videos on the same YouTube channel. As of the morning of January 19, the Narodna Pravda channel was closed, and the video with Bihus.info employees was not available.

"The leaked video of the covert filming and wiretapping of Bihus.info employees was published just two days after an incident involving another well-known investigative journalist.

On the evening of January 14, several people in military uniforms came to the apartment of Yuriy Nikolov, editor of the Nashi Groshi project and author of an investigation into embezzlement in the Ministry of Defense in the procurement of food for the Armed Forces (eggs for 17 UAH, etc.). According to the video, which soon appeared on anonymous telegram channels, the individuals were banging on the door of the apartment and demanding that the journalist "go to the front." Finally, they pasted over the door of Nikolov's apartment with papers with the words "Traitor", "Provocateur", "Go serve in the army" and retreated, frightening his mother – the journalist was not at home at the time.