They were covering the war: British journalists recorded the moment they were shot by Russian troops

The British network’s chief correspondent SkyNewsStuart Ramsay, and camera operator, Richie Mockler, were shot in their bulletproof vests and survived an ambush by a Russian reconnaissance squad as they drove to the town of Bucha, 30 kilometers from the capital of UkraineKyiv. “The first round broke the windshield. Cameraman Richie Mockler huddled in the front passenger footwell. So we were under full attack”, he recounted in a first person chronicle published yesterday the reporter, who suffered the attack last Monday.

Ramsay said that, at first, the team thought it was an error by the Ukrainian Army at a ‘checkpoint’, but when they verified that they were still shooting, despite the fact that they shouted at the attackers that they were pressThey realized that they were in danger.

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“Producer Martin Vowles, who was driving, got out of the car first, quickly followed by Andrii Litvinenko, our local producer, leaving me, Richie and my producer Dominique Van Heerden inside, sheltering in the footwells and in the back seat. ”, affirmed the journalist, hit by a bullet in the lower part of the back.

After a few confusing moments, the producer of the British chain was able to get out of the car and went to a highway barrier, where she took refuge for a few moments while the shots continued and the chief correspondent and the camera operator tried to flee. “Richie says I then got out of the car and stood up, before jogging to the edge of the embankment and then running. I lost my balance and fell to the bottom, landing like a sack of potatoes, cutting my face. My bulletproof vest and helmet almost certainly saved me.”

Later, the camera operator was also able to get out of the vehicle and the five security workers SkyNews they ran to a concrete wall to protect themselves, from where they were able to take refuge in a factory that was open.

Evacuation of civilians. (AFP Agency – AFP).

“We were convinced that the shooters would come to finish us off. A door opened and three guards beckoned us into their workshop.”, indicated the correspondent and confirmed that the rest of the night they were in the factory waiting for a rescue from the British chain, which they notified of what had happened.

“Outside, the sounds of battle intensified. We had no idea what was going on, but we were afraid that at any moment the garage doors would explode inside and armed men came to kill us,” he said.

To finish his chronicle, that of one of the most difficult moments he had to live through, Ramsay recounts that the Ukrainian Police escorted the Sky News team, after hours of uncertainty and gunfire outside the warehouse, to a safe place. “Thousands of Ukrainians are dying and families are being targeted by Russian death squads“, Hill.

The attack, amid the controversy

Russia blocked yesterday Facebookrestricted access to Twitter and introduced harsh prison sentences for those who publish “false information” about the Armyin a new twist of the internal repression in the midst of the invasion of Ukraine.

The measures taken reinforce the arsenal of the authorities to control the narrative before the Russian population about the invasion of Ukraine, launched on February 24 and presented as a limited operation that seeks to protect Russophone Ukrainians from a “genocide”.

an amendment It provides for sentences of up to fifteen years in prison for anyone who spreads information that tries to “discredit” the Russian armed forces. While another provides sanctions for “calls to impose sanctions on Russia”, confronted with harsh retaliation from the West for the invasion of Ukraine.

These texts, which apply to both the media and individuals, came into force after their approval by the Russian Parliament and the ratification by President Vladimir Putin late at night.

Given this measure, The Bloomberg News agency and the BBC (British public broadcaster) announced the suspension of the activity of their journalists in Russia, and the American CNN, the broadcasting of their programs.

Earlier, the Russian authorities announced that they had restricted access to the BBC, the German Deutsche Welle (DW), the independent Russian site Meduza (headquartered in Riga, Latvia), Radio Svoboda, also Russian, Voice of America and to other unnamed information sites.

An aerial view of the remains of the house of local culture after an overnight airstrike in the town of Byshiv, 40 kilometers west of Kiev, Ukraine, on Friday, March 4, 2022. (Efrem Lukatsky – AP)

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Source: Elcomercio