ER Editor: UPDATE – RT just published a piece stating Gonzalo Lira, alas, didn’t manage to escape Ukraine after all. See
US journalist missing after attempt to flee Ukraine
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We’ve reported on Gonzalo Lira‘s difficulties with the Ukrainian authorities before. This isn’t the first time he’s been arrested. However, this time it seems far worse, to the point where he has had to quit Ukraine, or at least has tried to. After being arrested in early May, he was released on bail on July 6 after experiencing torture from the inmates, but faces trial today, where it seems he will certainly be found guilty. Likely he has already fled Ukraine.
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This was the last we posted in May of this year when he was re-arrested —
Ukraine’s Secret Services Have Arrested Journalist Gonzalo Lira Again
This is from April, 2022 —
Gonzalo Lira Is Safe and Sound [VIDEO]
See this RT report of 2 days ago —
US-Chilean journalist describes torture in Ukrainian prison
Of note:
Gonzalo Lira has reappeared three months after his arrest by the SBU
Chilean-American blogger Gonzalo Lira, who was arrested by Ukrainian intelligence in May on charges of pro-Russian sympathies, reappeared online on Monday and told a sordid tale of beatings and extortion while awaiting a show trial.
“I was tortured in two of the four cells I was in—by the other prisoners,”Lira posted in a 25-tweet thread on Monday evening, noting that all the torture in the pre-trial detention center (SIZO) was outsourced to the inmates.
“I got a cracked rib in my first cell, but it wasn’t too bad. The worst stretch was in my fourth cell. From 1pm on June 21 until 7pm the next day—30 hours” two inmates tortured him and at one point “used a toothpick to scratch the whites of my left eye, while asking me if I could still read if I had just one,” Lira wrote.
Checking Twitter today, Wednesday August 2 – the day Lira is supposed to go to court in Ukraine, nothing new has been posted, but there was a lot of tweeting activity yesterday. Check out his Twitter account.
We’ve always been puzzled by the fact that Lira chose to stay in Ukraine and continue his online criticisms. Which could be difficult due to his having two young children. His tweets for August 1 2023 show that the Ukrainian authorities had been indirectly signalling him to get out of the country before now. At least, that is a friend’s interpretation of what the Ukrainian authorities were telling him.
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Gonzalo Lira went through hell in Ukraine: ‘This is one of the most dramatic videos I’ve ever seen’
ROBIN DE BOER via NINE FOR NEWS
Journalist Gonzalo Lira made critical videos about Ukraine from the Ukrainian city of Kharkiv. He was rounded up, imprisoned, tortured by fellow prisoners and robbed of his money.
The charge against him is that he committed ‘Russian propaganda’, and for that he must spend five to eight years in a labor camp, something he says he will not survive.
The judge will rule on August 2 and Lira has already been told that he will be sentenced. In fact, he received a death sentence for expressing his opinion.
(Video removed? Click here…)
Robbing, corrupt, murderous gangster regime
On Monday Lira wrote a long Twitter thread and he also made three videos in which he stands next to his motorcycle in the parking lot of a gas station near the border between Ukraine and Hungary. According to journalist Joost Niemoller, he has now arrived safely in Hungary. (ER: We haven’t got confirmation of this – it doesn’t show up in Joost Niemoller’s twitter account.)
Lira writes on Twitter that Zelensky’s Ukraine is not a democracy, but a thieving, corrupt, murderous gangster regime masquerading as ‘Western’ democracy.
He was beaten and kept awake for 30 hours in prison. He also suffered a broken rib. At one point, two inmates held his head and used a toothpick to scrape off the white of his left eye.
Right now, I’m about to try to get out of Ukraine, and seek political asylum in Hungary.
Either I’ll cross the border and make it to safety, or I’ll be disappeared by the Kiev regime.
This is what’s happened to me over the past three months.
1/25
— Gonzalo Lira (@GonzaloLira1968) July 31, 2023
No choice
One of the prisoners hit him so hard and so often that a huge yellow-green spot appeared on his chest.
A prisoner later apologized and said he had no choice. “He didn’t lie. I understood,” says Lira.
What happened to ‘European democratic values’?
Nearly $100,000 was stolen. He can whistle to his computers and telephone.
“Kiev arrested and imprisoned me because of YouTube videos! Because of freedom of speech! What happened to ‘European democratic values’?”
CONTINUE READING HERE
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Thanks! we just bumped into that …
RT has published an article where they cite a source who claimed he “was detained at the border”.
https://www.rt.com/russia/580721-gonzalo-lira-missing-ukraine/
Anyone who watched the cri de coeur of his 3-part youtube video’s know that they were asked to raise the alarm.
Agreed.
I couldn’t find Joost Niemoller’s tweet either, but for some reason they don’t show his last tweets first anymore.
Also tried to find confirmation of his well-being elsewhere… but I haven’t seen it.
From the time of writing this comment, it’s been about 36 hours since we last heard from Gonzalo. That’s not good.