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Automatically translated version. May contain inaccuracies compared to the original.
He was suspected of surveilling a location that was of interest to defendants in a spying case.
The Vienna prosecutor’s office explained why they arrested Ukrainian investigative journalist Mykhailo Tkach. He was seen observing a location that had previously been monitored by two suspects in the espionage case. The prosecutor’s office emphasized that this was unrelated to journalistic activity. Tkach and camera operator Yaroslav Bondarenko were released without charges, Reuters reports.
Two Ukrainians were detained in Vienna last Monday on suspicion of espionage. On Thursday police detained two more Ukrainians: investigative journalist Tkach and camera operator Bondarenko. The first two were remanded in custody pending investigation.
The prosecutor’s office explained that during the investigation of the first two men suspicions arose regarding a third man. His name was not given in the statement, but it appears to be Tkach. The suspicions were based, among other things, on eyewitness testimony that saw three men near the same location. They observed it during the same period and in the same manner. The prosecutor’s office decided that the three Ukrainians might belong to the same group and ordered the arrest of the third man.
The fourth man, presumably Bondarenko, was in the same car when police found Tkach. That is why both were detained.
“At the time of the arrests it was not known that the suspects were a Ukrainian investigative journalist and a camera operator,” the statement said. “The arrests were in no way related to the professional activities of these two men,” the prosecutor’s office added.
Bondarenko suffered cuts from shards of glass from the car window during the arrest. Tkach, Bondarenko and the editorial staff of Ukrainska Pravda criticized the actions of the Austrian authorities. In their view, the men could simply have been summoned for questioning.
The Austrian authorities are not disclosing details of the case against the two Ukrainians who remain in custody. According to Austrian media, they are suspected of working for the Ukrainian intelligence service.
Ukrainska Pravda reported that Tkach and Bondarenko came to Vienna on an editorial assignment related to searching for former Prosecutor General Ruslan Kravchenko. He left Ukraine on the night of 14 September and registered in Vienna. However, the address given is the office of a company that sells legal addresses.
Ukrainska Pravda editor-in-chief Sevhil Musaieva recalled that previously detained colleagues were released after an hour to an hour and a half. This time Tkach was held for more than 12 hours.
About why the story of the escape of former Prosecutor General Kravchenko went far beyond a conflict between two law enforcement agencies, editor of the domestic politics desk at ZN.UA Inna Vedernikova writes in the article “The Fugitive’s Syndrome. How not to turn the state into a meme.” // Dzerkalo Tyzhnia
Document: PDF proof of the original version of the news item "Австрія назвала причину затримання журналіста Ткача у Відні". It records the publication content at the moment of the first scan, the preservation date and the source: CRIMINAL UKRAINE.
