Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy personally thanked the Russian reporter who interrupted live state TV coverage to wave a "No War" sign in front of the camera in protest of the invasion of Ukraine during one of his video addresses Tuesday.
During the evening broadcast on Channel One Russia, the most prominent news network in the country, a woman identified as editor Marina Ovsyannikova rushed onto the set standing behind the anchor and chanted in Russian, "No to war! Stop the war!" She held a sign that read in Russian, "Stop the war! Don’t believe propaganda! They’re lying to you here!" with "Russians against war" printed in English, before the channel quickly cut away.
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Ovsyannikova was detained following the interruption and initially reported missing by human rights groups until appearing in court. Russian law bans "public actions aimed at discrediting the use of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation."
A person interrupts a live news bulletin on Russia's state TV "Channel One" holding up a sign that reads "NO WAR. Stop the war. Don't believe propaganda. They are lying to you here." at an unknown location in Russia March 14, 2022. (Channel One/via REUTERS)
Zelenskyy shared his gratitude toward the reporter for her bold stunt in his Tuesday remarks.
"I am grateful to those Russians who don't stop trying to convey the truth," Zelenskyy said. "To those who fight disinformation and tell the truth, real facts to their friends and loved ones. And personally to the woman who entered the studio of Channel 1 with a poster against the war."
In this photo provided by the Ukrainian Presidential Press Office, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy delivers his speech addressing the nation in Kyiv, Ukraine, Friday, Feb. 25, 2022. ( (Ukrainian Presidential Press Office via AP))
"To those who are not afraid to protest, as long as your country has not completely closed itself from the world, turning into a very large North Korea, you must fight," he continued. "You must not lose your chance."
Ovsyannikova released a video statement before running onto the set of Channel One.
"What’s happening in Ukraine is a crime and Russia is the aggressor. And there is only one person responsible for this, this man is Vladimir Putin," Ovsyannikova said in Russian. "My father is Ukrainian, and my mother is Russian, they have never been enemies, and this necklace is a symbol – that Russia must immediately stop this war and our brotherly nations can still come together."
Vladimir President Vladimir Putin ordered Russia’s all-out invasion of Ukraine only eight months after TIME magazine billed President Biden as ready to take on the Russian leader. (Sputnik, Kremlin Pool Photo via AP)
She added how "ashamed" she was to have worked at Channel One the last couple of years because she had been helping broadcast "Kremlin propaganda."
"Sadly, I’ve been working on the First Channel during last couple of years, have been doing Kremlin propaganda, for which now I am very ashamed," Ovsyannikova said.
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She was one of multiple Russian reporters to speak out against the actions of Russian President Vladimir Putin. Russian journalist Maria Baronova recently quit her state-TV job as the editor-in-chief of the Russian version of Russia Today, a state-run media operation also known as RT, after condemning the invasion of Ukraine.
"If I chose to be with Russia, this does not mean that I should walk in a totalitarian system, be silent or, for example, rejoice that the regime, which I do not want for my country, is being exported somewhere else," Baronova wrote last week on her Telegram channel, Znak.com reported. "And this regime will finally turn our life into one endless hell. What's there. Already turned."
Fox News Digital research didn't find any examples of Putin being directly linked to the murder of a journalist. But 38 journalists have been murdered in Russia since 1992. Eighty-one percent of those cases have not been solved, and seven journalists have gone missing in Russia and have not been found, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists.
A 35-hour curfew has been enacted in Kyiv, Ukraine's capital city, as Russian forces continue to advance with heavy artillery fire.
Fox News' Joseph A. Wulfsohn contributed to this report.
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