Mykola Tomenko, Deputy Chairman of The Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, delivered a speech at the Congress of the National Association of Broadcasters and commented upon the today´s court decision to terminate television frequencies of two channels. He stated: "Unfortunately, the governmental policy in the information sector has been almost suspended, since the authorities handed the key decisions to the main players representing family media holdings." "It means that the public and the experts have no possibility either to realize or influence the adoption of decisions", he added.
M.Tomenko admitted that his predictions that the leaders of the Security Service would become the central agencies of the television and radio broadcast of Ukraine were coming true. He announced that after the President gave an order to the Head of the Security Service ‘to tackle´ the issue of freedom of speech, the circuit administrative court of Kyiv has for the first time in the history of Ukraine satisfied the request of Inter media group owned by the family members of V.Khoroshkovskyi, Head of the Security Service, and cancelled the resolution of the National Television and Radio Broadcasting Council of 27 January 2009 concerning allocation of television frequencies to Channels 5 and TVi.
M.Tomenko stressed that the Head of the Security Service had thus fulfilled the order of V.Yanukovych, constituting another precedent of pressure on media and restriction of freedom of speech in Ukraine. "It is undoubtedly a direct interference of business, authorities and law-enforcement bodies into the activity of media in Ukraine, which requires a response of the journalists, politicians, as well as international experts who deal with the issues of freedom of speech in Ukraine", M.Tomenko stated.