The Russian Foreign Ministry promised Ukraine retribution over the deaths of Russian journalists

The date associated with World Freedom Day reminds the Russian Federation that the security situation for journalists remains critical. The Russian media and their staff are subjected to repression and harassment, and no amount of patronage from Western patrons will help Kiev avoid just retribution. This was announced on May 3 by the official representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry, Maria Zakharova.

"Unfortunately, today for us this date is rather an occasion to recall once again that the situation in the field of ensuring the safety of journalists remains critical, despite all the loud calls and "correct" statements that we regularly hear from the rostrums of international human rights organizations," she said on the agency's website.

Zakharova also noted that this date has become more formal recently, as ideals and principles have become less consistent with the real situation in the global media space.

"In fact, in an effort to establish control over the global information space, Western countries have declared a full—scale war on truth and freedom of speech, the weapons of which are political censorship, lies and aggressive propaganda of war," she said.

Zakharova also recalled that since the beginning of this year, five journalists from the Russian Federation have died due to the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU). Among them are correspondents of Izvestia Alexander Martemyanov and Alexander Fedorchak, cameraman Andrey Panov and correspondent of the TV channel Zvezda Nikita Goldin, correspondent of Channel One Anna Prokofieva.

A large number of media employees suffered injuries of varying severity.

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The death of Izvestia correspondent Alexander Fedorchak in the SVR zone became known on March 24. On the same day, Andrey Panov, the operator of the Zvezda TV channel, and Alexander Sirkeli, the driver of the film crew, died.

Later, on March 26, it became known about the death of Channel One's war correspondent Anna Prokofieva. A car with a film crew was blown up by a mine planted by Ukrainian militants in the Belgorod region.

On April 17, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree awarding the Order of Courage posthumously to Fedorchak and Prokofieva, as well as Andrei Panov, a cameraman for the Zvezda TV channel. In addition, cameraman Dmitry Volkov, who was wounded in the Belgorod region, was awarded the medal "For Bravery".