Ukraine's new political leadership should take swift action to make sure that media freedoms do not further erode in the country, an official of the OSCE rights watchdog said on Wednesday.
Dunja Mijatovic, OSCE representative on media freedom, spoke amid concerns by many local news outlets that freedoms gained under the pro-Western Viktor Yushchenko were being rolled back under President Viktor Yanukovich, who came to power in February.
Ukrainian media have complained of a growing number of physical attacks on journalists and expressed particular concern about journalist Vasyl Klymentyev, missing since Aug. 11.
Mijatovic, who met Foreign Minister Kostyantyn Hryshchenko and other Ukrainian officials, welcomed public pledges by the authorities to uphold press freedoms, but she said the Klymentyev case and instances of intimidation of journalists had had a "chilling effect" on the media.
"Concrete action is needed before the current negative developments become a permanent indicator of the deteriorated media climate in the country," she said in a statement.
"To restore the trust of Ukrainian society and of the international community, the authorities should continue to publicly condemn and, more importantly, swiftly investigate all cases of violence and intimidation of journalists, giving priority to the case of Klymentyev, who is still missing," she said.
Klymentyev, editor-in-chief of the "Novuy Stil" newspaper which focuses on corruption issues in the eastern Kharkiv region, disappeared in August and is presumed dead.
The country’s interior minister has said publicly that law enforcement officers may have been involved in his disappearance.
The Ukrainian press was harassed and intimidated under the long presidency of Leonid Kuchma, but it grew significantly freer after the 2004 Orange Revolution brought the liberal Yushchenko to power.
But media defence groups are now increasingly complaining of a return to censorship and pressure since Yanukovich was elected, though he himself has pledged several times to defend media freedoms.
The United States and media rights group Reporters Without Borders have voiced concerns about the worsening situation in Ukraine.
