Ukraine: Radical nationalists group detain two journalists

Kiev: Ukraine’s radical nationalist group Right Sector on Tuesday confirmed its members had detained two journalists from Crimea working in war-torn east Ukraine. “I confirm that the journalists Yevgenia Korolyova and Maxim Vasilenko were arrested yesterday evening near Donetsk,” one of Right Sector’s leaders Andriy Tarasenko told AFP. “We have determined who they are and now we are going to let them go.” [caption id=“attachment_1607763” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Representational image. AP[/caption] The two journalists work for the weekly Crimean Telegraph, based on the Black Sea peninsula. Vasilenko, a photographer, has also contributed work to Agence France-Presse and Russian state news agency RIA-Novosti. The two went missing Sunday after working in east Ukraine’s rebel stronghold of Donetsk. The weekly’s editor Maria Volkonskaya told AFP that the journalists had not been heard from since Sunday evening, when Korolyova phoned a friend to say they had been detained. The reporter said that “Right Sector had taken them off the bus” on which they had been travelling from Donetsk to return to Crimea, Volkonskaya said when contacted by AFP late Monday. The reporters left Donetsk after covering the humiliating parade of captive Ukrainian soldiers organised by the pro-Russian rebels in control of the city, Volkonskaya added. Russia annexed Ukraine’s Black Sea peninsula of Crimea in March after deploying troops to help organise a disputed referendum that saw residents vote to switch to rule from Moscow. AFP