Russia Furious Over Journalist Killed in Ukraine; Witness Alleges Devious Plot

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In this Monday, June 30, 2014 frame grab provided by Russian Channel One, Anatoly Klyan, the veteran cameraman, who worked for Russia's Channel One and who has been killed in eastern Ukraine when a bus carrying journalists and soldiers' mothers was hit by gunfire, is seen in an undisclosed location.

Image: Russian Chanel One via APTN/Associated Press

By Christopher Miller2014-06-30 14:56:12 UTC

DONETSK, Ukraine — Moscow expressed outrage on Monday over the shooting death of a Russian state television cameraman in the eastern Ukrainian city of Donetsk overnight, accusing Kiev security forces of targeting its journalists and breaking the president’s promise of a cease-fire. However, details on how the event truly played out are murky.

Anatoly Klyan, 68, an experienced cameraman for Russia’s state-sponsored Channel One was killed after Ukrainian government forces opened fire on a bus carrying conscripts’ mothers and journalists, according to the news channel.

See also: For Pro-Russia Militants, Ukraine's Journalists Are Bargaining Chips

The bus, adorned with peace signs and reportedly carrying mothers of Ukrainian troops barricaded inside the military unit, was first fired upon as it approached the compound, Channel One said. It immediately retreated some 550 yards before stopping and letting passengers outside.

It was then, as a passenger lit a cigarette and a flare from the Ukrainian unit was fired into the night sky that Klyan was shot in the stomach. The driver of the bus, a man dressed in fatigues and donning an orange and black separatist ribbon, was shot in the neck.

But a journalist who was aboard the bus during the shooting told Mashable an alternative story, saying that while the incident was tragic, the event “felt like theater.”

The journalist, who is Russian, spoke on condition of anonymity, because he feared reprisals from colleagues and separatist militiamen for telling a story that contradicted the one presented by Russian state media.

“During the ride I asked some of the mothers about their sons, and they seemed not know anything about their own boys,” he said. Moreover, he alleged that the whole thing was “probably a provocation” to inflame Moscow and heighten tensions between the Kremlin and Kiev.

Footage (embedded below) recorded by Russian journalists from LifeNews shows the driver clutching the back of his head as blood streams down his neck. Behind him, passengers are seen attending to and encouraging a pale and spiritless Klyan slouched in the aisle as the bus trundles away. He later succumbed to his injuries.

Klyan was the fifth journalist to be killed and the third from a Russian state-sponsored news outlet since pro-Russian separatists besieged the eastern Ukrainian regions of Donetsk and Luhansk in April.

“We are outraged with Kiev’s line regarding reporters from Russia working in dangerous conditions in Ukraine and demand that such pursuits and outrage be stopped immediately and those guilty be punished,” the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement on Monday.

“A cruel and absolutely illegal manhunt after Russian journalists continues in Ukraine,” it added.

State Duma Speaker Sergei Naryshkin said Klyan’s death sends an “alarming signal to the global community” and urged Kiev to investigate the tragedy, adding that he was “deeply grieving.”

“He was our colleague, too, having accreditation with the State Duma,” Naryshkin told reporters after a Duma Council meeting on Monday.

Naryshkin also alleged that the killing was targeted.

“There are valid reasons to believe that he was killed precisely because of what he did as a profession,” he said.

Anatoly Klyan, 68, who had worked for the state channel for 40 years, was the fifth journalist to be killed since the fighting began in April between Ukrainian government troops and armed pro-Russia separatists.

The two other Russian journalists were killed on June 17 by mortar fire during clashes between Ukrainian and separatist forces near Luhansk. An Italian journalist and his Russian translator were also cut down by mortar fire, but during fighting in the separatist bastion Sloviansk, Donetsk region on May 24.

Meanwhile, fighting continued overnight and on Monday afternoon between Ukrainian government forces and pro-Russian separatist fighters on the outskirts of Sloviansk and in Metalist despite a truce called more than a week ago that was set to end Monday night.

The ceasefire, first introduced on June 20, is set to expire Monday night at 10 p.m. local time. Poroshenko is still considering an extension, which his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin has pushed for.

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Topics: Media, russia, Ukraine , US & World, World