Photo: European Solidarity press center
Journalist Dmitry Gordon in court actually refuted his own fake, which he spread against Petro Poroshenko. This was stated by the lawyer of the fifth president, Ilya Novikov, after the meeting of the Shevchenko district court.
As you know, Petro Poroshenko filed a lawsuit against Dmitry Gordon for spreading slander on the air of the program “Freedom of Speech by Savik Shuster” regarding the capture of Mariupol in 2014.
Dmitry Gordon’s lawyer Vasily Ryabchenko assured the judge at the hearing that he had clarified his legal position with his client. In particular, he stressed that Dmitry Gordon’s statements did not concern the fifth president of Ukraine, Petro Poroshenko.
“According to the principal, the statements, which in this case are the subject of legal proceedings in this case, they generally concerned the political leadership of the country,” Gordon’s lawyer said.
To the judge’s clarifying question whether this phrase concerned the plaintiff, the lawyer said: “It concerned the political leadership of the country as a whole. This did not apply to Pyotr Alekseevich personally.”
Ilya Novikov stressed that it was Gordon’s change of position that allowed the judge to refuse satisfaction, since Dmitry Gordon’s representative argued that all the words of the journalist were exclusively “value judgments”, and not facts, and did not concern Poroshenko.
“We 90% believe that this is a consequence of the fact that Gordon changed his position against what he says in public. Publicly, he said that he had evidence, that he was sure that he would defend himself, that he would bring a bunch of witnesses, but in fact, in court from the very beginning, he took the position that it was a value judgment when he said that President Poroshenko, who became president on June 7, 2014, gave the order to leave Mariupol to the Ukrainian troops, which was abandoned in May 2014, and dismissed on June 13, ”said Ilya Novikov.
At today’s meeting, Gordon, through his representative, stated that what he said does not even concern Poroshenko for the most part, that when he says “Ukraine’s leadership”, it is not Poroshenko, but it seems to be someone else.
Ilya Novikov Lawyer of Petro Poroshenko
“90% of us are already satisfied, because we got what we wanted. First of all, we received a refusal from Gordon from his public position, ”Novikov noted.
At the same time, he said that Poroshenko’s lawyers would file an appeal against this decision.
“We believe that the court decision should be 100%, not 90%, in accordance with the law,” the defender stated.
Novikov notes that this is, in principle, a very important story for the judicial practice of Ukraine.
“There is a certain conviction among people, even experienced journalists, that it is worth adding to any slander the statement “this is my opinion”, “I think so”, and this fully protects. We would like it to be fixed, and that is why we intend to appeal against this decision, that this is not so, ”Novikov said.
If Gordon, as in this case, or others, if they are not ashamed to give up their own words in order for the court to formally declare that they are not guilty, this emphasizes their attitude to their reputation, their own words. In principle, this approach of the respondent suits us rather.
Ilya Novikov Lawyer of Petro Poroshenko
The defender also added that today’s court decision “overturns the bridge” for the continuation of work to hold individuals accountable for disseminating false information. He explained that Poroshenko’s lawyers are preparing for a lawsuit with the Kvartal 95 studio, which, on the day of the tragedy in Olenivka, spread another slander against Poroshenko.
“We won’t stop there. We intend to use this process and generally use the tools that the civil process provides to a person who believes that false information has been circulated about him in order to force people who have disseminated such information to publicly change their position, ”Novikov assured.
As reported, the lawyers of the fifth President of Ukraine, leader of the European Solidarity party, Petro Poroshenko, filed a lawsuit with the Shevchenkovsky District Court of Kyiv against blogger and politician Dmitry Gordon, who, on the air of the talk show Freedom of Speech Savik Shuster, said: “… I I know that the leadership of Ukraine made a criminal deal with the leadership of Russia and ordered the Ukrainian army to leave Mariupol… Poroshenko and Putin agreed, I believe, to surrender Mariupol. The army was ordered to leave Mariupol.”
In fact, the capture of Mariupol by pro-Russian militants took place in May 2014, even before the presidential elections. On June 7, Petro Poroshenko took the oath of the President of Ukraine, and a week later Mariupol was finally liberated from the Russian occupiers.
Earlier, Ilya Novikov noted that Gordon actually admitted that he was telling a lie about Poroshenko. Gordon, as expected, cannot provide the court with confirmation of his statements, therefore he tries to pass them off as “value judgments”.
Recall that in the documentary film by Tatiana Chernovol and Yuri Rudenko, the fifth President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko spoke in more detail about the battles for Mariupol in June 2014.
Source: PRM
