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Since the beginning of May, Detector Media has been collecting data about people on the air of the United News telethon (read the results for May, June, July, and August), and since the beginning of July, about the Russian-language FreeDom marathon, broadcast on the satellite and online foreign broadcasting channel of the same name FreeDom (July, August). This marathon was launched in March and is intended for Russian-speaking audiences outside Ukraine, primarily in Russia. Every day, a summary of the previous day's broadcast is featured in the Daily News section.

In August, the foreign broadcasting channel UA or UATV was renamed FreeDom. There is uncertainty as to what "FreeDom" stands for – the actual telethon, broadcast on the channel of the same name, or the air of this TV channel, which includes blocks of programming from other channels and media groups as well as that made by the foreign broadcasting channel's editorial office. In order to avoid confusion between the editorial office of the International Broadcasting Multimedia Platform of Ukraine, which produces part of the air of FreeDom, and the entire marathon, which airs blocks from different broadcasters, we will refer to the entire broadcast as the “FreeDom marathon”, and to the TV channel and its editorial office as the "foreign broadcasting channel".

Compared to August, the number of appearances/interviews and unique guests in September remained almost unchanged:

The gender "balance" in the marathon remained unchanged in September - 16.5% of conversations have female participants, 18% of people interviewed on Russian-language broadcasting are women.

However, this time, there are more women among the top guests. The most popular woman on the air of the foreign broadcasting marathon is Russian political commentator Olga Kurnosova (11 appearances in September), followed by the spokeswoman of the Operational Command South Natalia Humeniuk with 10 appearances. In addition, it must be noted that Natalia Humeniuk appears most frequently on the air of the United News joint telethon for the second month in a row. A representative of the United States Department of State, Andrea Kalan, was on the air nine times, and Olga Romanova, leader of CSO Russia Behind Bars, was on the air eight times. Advisor to the Head of the Kharkiv Regional Military Administration Natalia Popova, Servant of the People MP Maria Mezentseva, and founder of the Antitrust League Agiya Zagrebelska were on the air several times each. However, the number of appearances of female commentators paled in comparison to the top leaders – military expert Oleh Zhdanov, political commentator Volodymyr Fesenko, and Russian political commentator Andrey Piontkovsky. The problem of gender imbalance on the air of the foreign broadcasting marathon was voiced as a concern by Halyna Petrenko, Director of Detector Media, during a meeting of the Committee on Information and Humanitarian Policy of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine. The head of FreeDom Yulia Ostrovska and its editor-in-chief Oleksiy Matsuka have not yet had the opportunity to respond to this observation, but we hope that they will take it into account. Women make up more than 50% of the human population, yet they receive only 16% of all broadcast talk time.

It appears that the same people are at the top as in August, but it is interesting to note that Mykhailo Podolyak, Advisor to the Head of the Office of the President, is increasingly seen on foreign broadcasting. He has become the main "voice of the Office of the President" in September on the United News joint telethon as well.

One of the problems of FreeDom, which was discussed at the above-mentioned meeting of the parliamentary committee, is the monopoly of the Servant of the People party on taking part in the foreign broadcasting marathon, which was revealed by Detector Media’s August study. During August, ten MPs appeared on the air a total of twenty times, and all of them represented the Servant of the People. It seems that the editorial staff of the foreign broadcasting marathon failed to draw the conclusions that might be expected, and instead of diversifying the party palette, we had twelve "servants" with thirty-five appearances on the air in September:

Compared to September, Fedir Venislavskyi dropped from the first place in the list of regular guests, while Yehor Chernev became more popular. According to Yevheniya Kravchuk, who was a guest of the foreign broadcasting marathon more than once in August and September, such attention to her party is due to the membership of "servants" in the parliamentary assemblies of the Council of Europe and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe. However, the Ukrainian permanent delegation to PACE, as well as the delegation to the OSCE includes members of other parties and parliamentary groups. In particular, there are many questions raised by the presence on the air of a militant anti-vaccinationist Yuriy Kamelchuk, who was a regular on Medvedchuk's channels and Nash.

In any case, if the fact that there were only "servants" on foreign broadcasting in August could be considered a coincidence, it is unlikely that the repetition of this situation with almost twice as much representation on the air in September is also coincidental. We are dealing with the monopoly of one political party on the air of a government-owned TV channel.

There is another point related to party affiliation and reputation. In September, the Ukrainian army liberated most of the previously occupied territories of the Kharkiv Region, so the situation in that region was a hot topic. Four times during the month, Vadym Krokhmal appeared on foreign broadcasting, captioned as "deputy of the Kupiansk City Council". However, they forgot to mention that Krokhmal was elected from the Party of Shariy, a political force banned in Ukraine. FreeDom is not the only channel where they forgot about Krokhmal's political biography, the same happened on the air of Current Time TV. He also appeared twice on the air of the United News marathon. In our opinion, even if Krokhmal "sided with Ukraine" and no longer shares the views of his party leader, this fact from the politician's biography is extremely important and should influence the decision of guest editors to invite him on the air. At the very least, if, say, no one else but this politician can comment on the situation in Kupyansk, his affiliation with Shariy's Party should have been mentioned in the guest intro.

In general, the representation of Russia, Ukraine, and other states on the air of the marathon remained unchanged. As before, the Ukrainian regulars are mainly military experts and political commentators, spokespersons of law enforcement agencies, and heads of regional state administrations (i.e. newsmakers), while the Russian regulars are experts who discuss the fate of Russia and social developments in the country. The mass exodus of Russians to Kazakhstan and Georgia has led to an increase in political commentators, journalists, and public figures from those countries. There were a number of emigrants who represented the United States, including Russian journalist Karina Orlova.

Countries represented by the guests of FreeDom TV channel

September 2022

The distribution of representation of different countries in the discussion of key topics has not changed. Most Russians comment on social issues (primarily Russian social developments), one and a half times more than Ukrainians. But in other areas, Russian voices are heard much less frequently.

Most frequently commented topics by guests of FreeDom TV channel

September 2022

You can also read daily reviews of the FreeDom marathon in the Foreign Broadcasting section.

Video screenshot from HROSHI/YouTube