2 years ago
NEW YORK — A live evening news program on Russia’s main state television channel was interrupted Monday by a person who walked into the studio holding a poster protesting the war in Ukraine.
An anchor was speaking during the newscast when a woman appeared on camera behind her holding a sign with the headline “no war” scrawled in English across the top, with a message in Russian below calling on people not to believe Russian propaganda.
The news program quickly cut away to another scene.
An independent human rights group that monitors political arrests identified the woman as Marina Ovsyannikova. The group, OVD-Info, posted on its website that Ovsyannikova, who identified herself as an employee of the station, was taken into police custody.
Ovsyannikova spoke out against the war in a video on OVD-Info’s website.
“What is going on now is a crime,” she said. “Russia is an aggressor country and Vladimir Putin is solely responsible for that aggression.”
She also said: “Unfortunately, I have been working at Channel One during recent years, working on Kremlin propaganda. And now I am very ashamed."
English (US)