Russian journalist who waved anti-war sign on state TV fears for her safety
A Russian state TV editor who hijacked a prime-time news show to denounce the war in Ukraine says she fears for her safety.
Marina Ovsyannikova, 43, said she was spurred on to carry out the protest after harrowing images from Ukraine jolted her own memories of growing up in Chechnya.
The region was torn apart by war after the breakup of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s.
The mum-of-two said she had initially supported president Vladimir Putin, but had grown disillusioned.
She said the war in Ukraine had reduced her to a state of shock before tipping her over the edge.
‘The war in Ukraine was like a trigger for me,’ she said.
‘Very vivid images from my childhood (in Chechnya) came flooding back. I understood I could feel what those unfortunate people (in Ukraine) are going through. It’s really beyond the pale.’
Ms Ovsyannikova said as a child, she lived in Chechnya’s Grozny and remembered fleeing fighting in the region.
‘There was shelling, I was 12 years old, we gathered up our things and left,’ she said.
She said before going on TV she first considered taking to a square near the Kremlin to protest, but concluded that would have little actual effect.
Instead, she burst onto the set of Russia’s most-watched news programme on Kremlin-controlled Channel One.
She ran behind the anchor and waved a sign saying: ‘NO WAR. Stop the war. Don’t believe the propaganda. They are lying to you here.’
‘I absolutely do not feel like a hero…You know, I really want to feel like this sacrifice was not in vain, and that people will open their eyes,’ Ms Ovsyannikova told Reuters from Russia.
The TV editor, whose father was Ukrainian, said she had no plans to leave Russia despite fears for her safety.
‘I believe in what I did but I now understand the scale of the problems that I’ll have to deal with, and, of course, I’m extremely concerned for my safety,’ she said.
‘The worst thing is when Ukrainians ring Russians and Russians ring Ukrainians, there’s always a conflict because the media and propaganda have divided us and put us on opposing sides of the barricades.’
Ms Ovsyannikova disappeared for 24 hours after her protest leading many to fear for her welfare.
Her lawyer said he could not make contact with the journalist or find her at the police station she was said to be held in.
Then yesterday, she appeared at a Moscow court and walked free after a judge fined her 30,000 roubles (£215).
However, the fine was only for a video she recorded prior to the protest in which she said she was ‘ashamed’ of having worked at Channel One and spreading ‘Kremlin propaganda’ – not her interruption of the news broadcast.
It is feared Ms Ovsyannikova could still be hit with a prison sentence under new legislation brought in to stamp out ‘deliberately false information’ about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Ms Ovsyannikova said she hoped she would not face criminal charges.
‘If I end up having to serve time in jail for what I believe in then I hope it’s a minimal sentence,’ she said.
She said she not only wanted to protest the war but to also send a message to Russians directly:
‘Don’t be such zombies; don’t listen to this propaganda; learn how to analyse information; learn how to find other sources of information – not just Russian state television’ she said.
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