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RFE/RL Correspondent's Car SetonFire inLviv

RFE/RL'S UKRAINIAN SERVICE

   KYIV - The car of an RFE/RL Ukrainian service correspondent in the
   western Ukrainian city ofLvivwas set on fire overnight on January 29-30
   -- an arson attackthatDeputy Interior Minister Anton Herashchenko said
   could have been ordered by someone.

   Halyna Tereshchuk, who has been working for RFE/RL since 2000, said she
   suspected the attack was linked to her professional activities.

   "We think the crime was ordered, that somebody hired someone to conduct
   it," Herashchenko told RFE/RL, adding that the police were doing
   "everything to find both the perpetrators and those who ordered the
   attack."

   The National Police inLvivsaid earlier in the day that a probe had been
   launched into the "deliberate destruction of the journalist's
   property."

   IFRAME:
   [1]https://www.rferl.org/embed/player/0/30410388.html?type=video

   According to witnesses, a masked individual approached the Mitsubishi
   Colt around midnight, placed something on the windshield of the
   vehicle, set fire to it and then fled.

   Second fire

   The Ukrainian unit of rights group Freedom House condemned the torching
   of not onlyTereschchuk'svehicle butalso,on the same day, the car of
   Andriy Lukin, an activist in Zaporizhzhya.

   "We are outraged by the fires '¦ and call on law enforcement agencies
   to investigate these incidents effectively," Freedom House Ukraine said
   on Facebook.

   The group stated that "arson or other methods of destruction of
   vehicles and property are becoming increasingly used as a means to
   pressure active people in Ukraine."

   It noted that there were 11 cases last year of property belonging to
   activists being destroyed and "in almost all cases, the perpetrators
   were not found and punished."

References

   1. https://www.rferl.org/embed/player/0/30410388.html?type=video

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