Russian invaders distributed a clone of "Ridne Prybuzhzhia" in Mykolaiv oblast to promote a pseudo-referendum on the accession of Kherson oblast and Snigurivka, Mykolayiv oblast, to Russia.
This statement was originally published on imi.org.ua on 19 December 2022.
In the town of Snigurivka (Mykolaiv oblast), which had been under Russian occupation from March to November 2022, the invading forces had distributed a ‘clone’ of the locally known newspaper, “Ridne Prybuzhzhia”. This story was reported by the IMI representative in Mykolaiv oblast.
The Russians used the layout, typeface, and name of the regional newspaper, having translated it into Russian – “Rodnoe Pribuzhye”.
The pro-Russian “Rodnoe Pribuzhye” (with only one issue published, dated September 23) was intended to promote a pseudo-referendum on the accession of Kherson oblast and Snigurivka, Mykolayiv oblast, to Russia. The newspaper’s source data indicate that it was printed in Kherson oblast, with a print run of 10,000 copies. There is no other information available, either on the publication, or the person responsible for the issue.
The “Ridne Prybuzhzhia” newspaper was founded in 1991 as Mykolaiv oblast’s official printed publication. In 2019, the newspaper was denationalized, and is currently a private enterprise headed by editor-in-chief Tetyana Fabrykova. Before the start of the full-scale war, the newspaper used to print three issues a week, with a print run of about 10,000 copies, and was distributed throughout Mykolaiv oblast.
Photo – NikVesti
As editor-in-chief Tetyana Fabrykova told IMI, the newspaper’s last issue was published on February 24, 2022; after that, it had to suspend its operation due to the hostilities. As of December, the publication has not resumed its work because of financial difficulties, the energy situation in Ukraine, and the journalists being physically absent from Mykolaiv, which remains a front-line city in the full-scale invasion.
Tetyana Fabrykova is outraged by the fact that the Russians created a clone of “Ridne Prybuzhzhia”, in order to exploit the newspaper’s reputation to promote pro-Russian propaganda among the residents of Mykolaiv oblast.
She said that “Ridne Prybuzhzhya” had been printed in Kherson for the last few years. Tetyana Fabrykova believes that the occupiers were able to gain access to the newspaper’s files which were stored in the printing house, and used them to create the clone.
“I was not aware of this situation, I am outraged by the fact that they used our logo, that they would issue such a thing. When the hostilities started in Mykolaiv oblast, we stopped printing the newspaper, because, first, we were doing it in Kherson, the printing press was there… Mykolaiv newspapers are now gradually resuming their work, in particular ‘Yuzhnaya Pravda’ and ‘Vechirniy Mykolaiv’, but we are not prepared to release another issue yet, because our journalists are not in Mykolaiv yet. I think that as soon as our power grid is stabilized, we will of course resume our work. We will fulfill all our obligations to our subscribers. Because we are almost a year behind. We only fulfilled our obligations to subscribers for January-February. This issue that you discovered is a scam, they know that such a newspaper existed, so they made use of it,” said Tetyana Fabrykova.
