Far-Right German Journalist Implicated In Firebombing Of Hungarian Center In Ukraine
By Sergii Stetsenko and Carl Schreck
KRAKOW, Poland -- A Polish man accused of involvement in the firebombing of a Hungarian cultural center in western Ukraine last year says he received instructions on the attack from a German journalist who has worked as a consultant for a German parliament deputy with the anti-immigrant Alternative for Germany (AfD) party.
Michal Prokopowicz, 28, told a Krakow court on January 14 that German journalist Manuel Ochsenreiter provided instructions for the February 4, 2018, attack on the headquarters of the Hungarian Cultural Association in Uzhhorod, the capital of the Zakarpattya region in western Ukraine.
No one was injured in the attack, but the incident -- and another fire attack on the building weeks later -- exacerbated already strained relations between Kyiv and Budapest over a Ukrainian education law that Hungary says restricts the right of ethnic Hungarians in Ukraine to be educated in their native language.
Prokopowicz is one of three Polish suspects with links to far-right movements who went on trial in Krakow on January 14 for the attack. Ukrainian authorities investigated the case and passed it along to their counterparts in Poland, where the three men were subsequently detained.
Polish public broadcaster TVP reported on January 5 that the authorities were investigating a German journalist in connection with the attack but did not identify the individual.
Ochsenreiter, 42, has ties to Polish right-wing activists, including Mateusz Piskorski, founder of the pro-Russian Change (Zmiana) party who was arrested in 2016 on suspicion of spying for Russia and China.
Reached by RFE/RL last week via the Russian social-networking site VKontakte, Ochsenreiter called the suggestion by Anton Shekhovtsov, a researcher of European far-right movements, that he might be the German journalist in question "bullshit." Ochsenreiter did not respond to follow-up questions and subsequently made his account private.
Ochsenreiter, editor of the right-wing German magazine Zuerst! (First!), has been a frequent commentator in Russian state media over the past five years, voicing support for Russia-backed separatists in eastern Ukraine and denouncing what he calls the Western media's anti-Moscow bias.
He has also worked in recent months as a consultant for Markus Frohnmaier, a member of Germany's parliament, the Bundestag, from the AfD and a strong proponent of lifting EU sanctions imposed on Russia over its aggression in Ukraine. Frohnmaier did not immediately respond to a request for comment on January 14.
Ralf Hoecker, a German attorney who responded on Ochsenreiter's behalf to RFE/RL's inquiry sent prior to the start of the trial, said in a January 14 e-mail that his client was unaware of any allegations from Polish authorities.
Asked to comment on Prokopowicz's claim that Ochsenreiter had provided instructions for the attack, Hoecker replied: "We are unaware of such a statement. If it was made, it is false."
There was no immediate indication that Ochsenreiter had been charged with any crime by Polish authorities.
Prokopowicz went on trial alongside two other suspects -- 25-year-old Tomasz Szymkowiak and 22-year-old Adrian Marglewski. All three are charged with promoting fascism, as well as endangering lives or property with fire.
Prokopowicz has also been charged with financing terrorism.
(Sergii Stetsenko of RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service reported from Krakow. Carl Schreck reported from Prague. With reporting from Uzhhorod by Iryna Breza of RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service and by Mark Krutov of RFE/RL's Russian Service)
That concludes our live-blogging of the Ukraine crisis for January 13, 2019. Check back here tomorrow for more of our continuing coverage.
The Last Link Of Luhansk
'Friendship Of The Peoples' Is A Street Divided Between Ukraine, Russia
By Tony Wesolowsky, Anastasia Magazova, and Andriy Dubchak
MILOVE, Ukraine -- Friendship Of The Peoples Street used to be more like a bridge, with the lives of residents in the Ukrainian border town of Milove intersecting with their neighbors just a stone's throw away in Russia's Chertkovo.
But today, a lengthy barbed-wire fence bisects the street, and patrols and checkpoints make clear that the relationship is not what it was.
Russian border guards built the 3-meter-high barrier four months ago, separating families and neighbors who had crossed freely between the two towns for decades.
"See that guy there?" asks Olena with a laugh as she points toward the fence. "He's already standing in Russia."
But the resident of Milove, who gave only her first name, is not joking. Her town lies in Luhansk Oblast, which has been riven by a war in eastern Ukraine between Kyiv and separatist forces. The man she points to is in Rostov Oblast, part of Russia, which is backing separatists in Ukraine's Luhansk and Donetsk regions.
The once-neighborly relationship turned chilly in 2014, when Russia seized Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula and sided with the separatists in Ukraine's eastern Donbas region.
The fighting has claimed more than 10,300 lives and prompted the West to impose sanctions against Russia, which denies involvement in the conflict despite a raft of evidence proving otherwise.
Milove has largely avoided the violence that has plagued other areas of Luhansk, parts of which are controlled by separatists, but Olena says the fence --erected amid deteriorating relations -- has compounded economic hardships for Milove residents.
"Russians bought fruits and vegetables here because they were cheaper and better. Now, small businesses are having a tough time," she says.