PACE co-rapporteur for the monitoring of Ukraine Renate Wohlwend (Liechtenstein, EPP/CD) has noted certain setback in democratic freedoms in Ukraine.
Wohlwend said this during a debate on the report on the functioning of democratic institutions in Ukraine at the PACE session in Strasbourg on Tuesday.
"It was particularly important to consider the development of the media in Ukraine. Some progress had been made in recent years but there had also been some retrograde steps," she said.
She recalled that journalists who disagreed with the regime had disappeared in recent years and there were also other indirect forms of censorship, such as searches of premises and tax controls.
"Most of the media in Ukraine support the regime and there is little criticism. These are very retrograde steps that should not be accepted. Media freedom is the litmus test for a country’s democratic institutions," Wohlwend said.
