DISINFO: Ukraine arrests teacher for promoting the Russian language
SUMMARY
Punitive actions against their own citizens began in Ukraine. Ukraine has imprisoned a teacher of the Russian language in the city of Kherson. The Ukrainian authorities are trying to put a woman in prison for the fact that she was engaged in the preservation of the Russian language on the territory of Ukraine.
RESPONSE
This is a recurring pro-Kremlin propaganda narrative about the alleged discrimination of Ukraine's Russian-speaking minority and the country's ubiquitous Russophobia. The case mentioned is ongoing trial against a resident of Kherson (a region of Ukraine bordering the temporarily occupied Crimea). The individual was detained by SBU officers suspected of high treason and not for "teaching Russian". Counterintelligence officers of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) reported on August 20 that they had stopped the activities of the FSB agent network of Russia, which operated in the Kherson region. According to the SBU, the suspect was recruited by the Russian special services in the illegally annexed Crimea in 2015. The case was heard behind closed doors at the request of the prosecution, which referred to the impossibility of disclosing the case materials. The suspect will remain under arrest until October 9. Also, the suspect was assigned a bail of half a million hryvnia. During the search, law enforcement officers seized the equipment through which the woman contacted the FSB, as well as other things that contain evidence of her activities, the investigation believes. The suspect may face punishment in the form of imprisonment for a term of 12 to 15 years with or without confiscation of property.