Lawyer: Ovcharenko's case wouldn’t have gone to court in a civilized state

Arrest of a UOJ journalist. Photo: Kyiv Regional Prosecutor's Office

The lawyer of the Orthodox journalist Andriy Ovcharenko commented on his detention and arrest.

According to the lawyer, the arrest of Ovcharenko has nothing to do with the presented charges. During the search in the journalist's house no materials compromising him were found.

"The accusations of cooperation with the FSB, working for an aggressor state, justifying armed aggression, and even more so, of high treason are completely groundless and do not contain any evidentiary basis," the lawyer said.

He also noted that no facts confirming that Andriy Ovcharenko was a member of a group that was engaged in destabilizing the socio-political situation in Ukraine were given.

"The whole accusation is based on speculations, distortions and biased attitude to the professional, i.e. journalistic activity of Andriy Ovcharenko", and "the case against him is clearly political and has all the signs of destruction of freedom of speech and self-expression," said Ovcharenko's lawyer.

According to him, "Ukraine, until recently, was considered a democratic state, in which the persecution of political opponents was perceived as a completely unacceptable action. The case against Orthodox journalists calls this thesis into question, because when a person is placed in a pre-trial detention center only because he should not have his own point of view on the processes taking place in the country, then democracy is out of the question."

"The whole case against journalists is so absurd and unthinkable that in no civilized country would it have even reached the investigator's office, let alone the Prosecutor's Office or the courtroom. We believe that the truth will win!" concluded the lawyer.

As reported by the UOJ earlier, according to Valery Stupnitsky’s lawyer, the case against the journalist is a political order.

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