The ambassador was told that “such intimidation” was not tolerated in Switzerland, where the constitution guarantees the freedom of information and of the press, a foreign ministry spokesman told the Keystone-SDA news agency on Thursday.
The foreign ministry was responding to a recent statement by the Russian embassy regarding the work of a Neue Zürcher Zeitung (NZZ) journalist covering the war in Ukraine. In Russia, wrote the embassy, the journalist’s coverage was liable to land him a financial penalty, a prison term, or a period of forced labour.
The NZZ article in question was about, among other things, Ukrainian resistance in the city of Melitopol in the south-eastern region of Zaporizhzhia.
The Russian embassy claimed that the vocabulary used in the article was aimed at justifying terrorism, and that the author had also reported “the most ridiculous inventions and rumours” – such as the “peaceful guerrilla actions including women from the city distributing pastries laced with laxatives to Russian soldiers” mentioned in the piece.
In a written response to the Tages-Anzeiger newspaper on Wednesday, the Russian embassy said its statement was “in no way threatening”. It wrote: “We merely remind NZZ journalists that despite freedom of expression they live in a rule of law, and they should follow the laws, which among other things forbid the supporting of terrorist activities, as we indicated to the dear journalist”.
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