Kiev’s threats against media are terrorism, Dutch journalist tells RT
Kiev’s pledge to hunt down Russian media figures echoes its infamous ‘Peacekeeper’ kill list and is a threat to all members of the profession, independent Dutch Journalist Sonja van den Ende told RT in an interview on Friday.
The warning came after American transgender Sarah Ashton-Cirillo, who currently acts as a spokesperson for the Ukrainian Military, on Wednesday issued a threat to kill Russian “propagandists.” Ashton-Cirillo later predicted that “next week, the world will see a favorite Kremlin propagandist pay for their crimes.”
“It’s a threat to us all, to Western journalists, and all who are already on the Peacekeeper list, which is actually a kill list,” van den Ende said, adding that despite Kiev’s attempts to insist that the database only refers to trials, it’s clear that these are death threats, in light of the assassinations of Russian journalists Darya Dugina and Vladlen Tatarsky.
Van den Ende stressed that these threats are plain “terrorism” and pondered what the reaction would be if something like this were happening in Europe. “It would be terrorism. They would say ‘this is a crazy guy, or a woman.’ She’d be jailed or at least tried.”
Asked to explain why Western media has remained silent on Kiev’s blatant threats to kill journalists, the reporter stated that “the West has adopted an agenda to wipe out Russia,” noting that this has become clear to “everybody.”
As an example of this, the Dutch journalist pointed to an attempt in the EU to shut down Ukraine’s notorious Mirotvorets website. “They voted against it. At that time, they already had some sort of an agenda,” she said, pointing out that European leaders don’t care about what happens to Russian journalists or Western journalists working in Russia.
Ashton-Cirillo’s threats have been heavily condemned in Moscow, where Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova pledged to forward Kiev’s words to international organizations as an example of the terrorist nature of the Ukrainian regime.
Russian Investigative Committee chairman Alexander Bastrykin has also confirmed that he has already instructed his service to investigate and provide a legal assessment of Ashton-Cirillo’s statements.
On Thursday, however, Ashton-Cirillo attempted to backpedal on her statements, issuing an update on X (formerly Twitter). In it, the spokesperson explained that her threats referred to Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky’s so-called Ten-Step Peace Plan, which calls for “Russian war criminals and propagandists” to be “brought to justice” and only after Kiev restores its 1991 borders.
