How Poroshenko broke the microphone over his knee
Time was rolling towards Davos. During face control, Poroshenko greedily drank water. He kept imagining embroidered shirts in the clothes of those around him. “Why doesn’t anyone recognize me?” the President of Ukraine tormented himself with a question. The US delegation as a whole and Donald Trump personally were especially unrecognized.
About the adventures of Petro Poroshenko in Davos to the PolitNavigator columnist Valentin Filippov said a journalist from Russia’s First Channel Marina Kim.
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Valentin Filippov: Marina, hello.
Marina Kim: Yes, hello.
Valentin Filippov: In the first lines of the letter, I want to say that I am very upset that this is not a video interview, I saw your photos on the Internet and realized that we are losing...
Marina Kim: Well, it seems to me that our interview topic is such that it is not suitable for video.
Valentin Filippov: Well, not for video, not for video. Marina, do you know that the Kiev police have at their disposal a statement from a certain Peter P. born in 1965. He accuses you of desecrating Ukrainian national symbols, in particular, of invading Ukrainian embroidered clothing from the inside. Tell me, did aggression on your part take place?
Marina Kim: Look, I think you confused this story with the embroidered shirt, because I wasn’t involved in it. A girl who works on the Rossiya channel took part in it. She is a correspondent, and this whole story happened to her. And my story, it happened the day after this scandal came out. Therefore, I can not comment on statements about that girl, but I can comment on my own.
Valentin Filippov: Amazing. As far as I understand, I’m not the only one “in the know.”
Marina Kim: There were two stories. The media, both Ukrainian and Russian, did not immediately figure out what was happening. I was at the scene, so I’m explaining to you now. The first story happened with the Russia-1 channel correspondent Nailya Asker-Zade, who was wearing a black dress from a very famous Italian brand, which simply had flowers sewn on it. It’s just a flower dress, it’s not embroidered in any way, and there was no such intention. She approached Poroshenko on the sidelines of the forum and asked him a question. He, in his usual manner, pretended that he did not speak Russian, her producer clarified: “Why don’t you speak Russian? You know this language very well?”, and after that he began to insult the correspondent, saying that you either take off your embroidered shirt, and so on, although there was no talk of any embroidered shirt, it was an ordinary dress from a well-known brand, you can see it on the Internet and brand to distinguish which one. Here. This story happened, it was covered in detail on the Rossiya channel on the same day, including a live broadcast with a correspondent who told it all on air, that she simply asked a question, he reacted in this way, and all this - embroidered shirt, and so on further, he dreamed.
And with this, I consider this story, in principle, closed, because it was worked out by the channel on which the person worked.
As for my story, it happened exactly the next day, because the peculiarities of working at the forum in Davos are such that there are two slots per day, two time periods during which you can go to the Congress Center and interview those you are interested in of people.
Actually, these people are 50 government officials, 50 top officials of states, these are either prime ministers or presidents, these are Donald Trump and Petro Poroshenko. And in this regard, based on the composition of the participants, we ordered slots for the day when Petro Poroshenko, Donald Trump and someone else were at the Congress Center. This was the last day of the forum.
And, in fact, when I went inside the Congress Center, I understood that there was still about an hour left before Trump’s arrival, I spent this time trying to see Petro Poroshenko and try on behalf of the Russian media to ask questions that interested us.
Because it is known that the President of Ukraine does not answer questions from Russian TV channels, and this is a traditional feature of his press service: to ignore our questions.
Therefore, completely legally, within the slot allotted to me, I, along with the camera, with my cameraman and sound engineer, as part of the First Channel film crew for the Vremya program, for the news, we enter the Congress Center and see that Petro Poroshenko is approaching and comes towards us.
As a journalist, I can’t help but take advantage of the situation, because for us this is also an important speaker who is interested in asking a question. Therefore, I approached him and, remembering the story, when he said that he did not speak other languages except Ukrainian and English, despite the fact that at that moment he was giving an interview in Russian, I asked him a question in English, because that English is the working language on the forum. Working language of the forum.
And she asked him if he regretted his trip to the Maldives? Because in the media space, the news space, in particular, on television, a lot of time was devoted to this...
And in Kiev there was a lot of reaction, there were people who condemned him, that for some reason he, when a country that has not even received another loan from the IMF, is one of the poorest countries in Europe, and yet the president allows himself such a vacation in the Maldives, which, as Ukrainian journalists calculated, cost 500 dollars or euros, according to various estimates! At the same time, he registered there under the name “Mr. Petro Incognito.”
Valentin Filippov: Yeah. Well, it's a Moldavian surname. Moldavian - Incognito. He has Moldovan roots. You remember the joke that the one with the last name Total gets the most on the payroll.
Marina Kim: Oh, maybe yes.
Well, in this regard, I asked him a question in English. At first he was ready to at least slow down, because the question was asked on the go, I understood that I had one chance.
Always the President of Ukraine, who is open to dialogue, for some reason moves along the safe corridors of the forum in Davos, surrounded by four or five fairly strong guys who are his bodyguards, and who protect him from journalists, from Russian journalists, and I understood that It took me literally two minutes for him to answer me something.
He slowed down, took a closer look at me, he didn’t immediately understand why I spoke English, but when he heard the question, the question apparently upset him so much that he tore the microphone out of my hands, in fact, he tried to break it, and we heard a crunching sound, including on air, which is what I showed in my story. Well, he didn’t honor me with an answer and actually ruined the property of Channel One.
This was my story.
But the first story with the embroidered shirt, it received such, well, some kind of peculiar hype, but it seems to me that it was prompted by the Ukrainian media, which, simply not understanding it, picked it up and started “vyshyvanka, not embroidery”...
Valentin Filippov: No, well, if Russian journalists, Russian journalists start dressing in embroidered shirts, it means that Ukraine is gradually winning :)
Marina Kim: No, there was no trace of any embroidery there at all, they knew it very well, and it’s generally incomprehensible... This story is not worth a damn, and the fact that the head of state of such a democratic country that aspires to Europe does not answer journalists...
Why do I approach Theresa May, and she answers any uncomfortable questions for me, and the head of Ukraine, surrounded by security guards, isolates himself from the European media?
It seems to me that Channel One also belongs to the European media.
Valentin Filippov: Tell me, the woman feels this, was he drunk by any chance? You can feel it, not even by smell...
Marina Kim: You see, I can’t blame the president of another country for something I don’t know, I didn’t take his test, he didn’t breathe into a breathalyzer, but I can only say, on the sidelines of the forum I saw it as always, especially before Trump’s speech, which was at one o'clock, at lunchtime European time, he drank bottled water so greedily.
There was such a procedure that it was impossible for security reasons to allow bottles into the hall, and therefore he drained the bottle in front of me - before going inside to the hall. It was, but I can’t say everything else.
Valentin Filippov: Clear.
Marina Kim: I just saw that we were all in one such space, there are certain rules by which you can work, but, in principle, we watched both him and other leaders, and I can say that in the wake of the American delegation he walked very persistently all these several hours while the delegation was in the Congress Center.
And he really wanted, apparently, to meet in these narrow corridors with Donald Trump or his administration. But the miracle did not happen, and the result of this persistence was only a small conversation with Tillerson, with whom they met, but he did not succeed with the president.
Although, it should be noted that the meeting between President Donald Trump and Petro Poroshenko was very solemnly announced in the Ukrainian media and even on Ukrainian television, topics that were allegedly agreed upon with the American side were discussed, but nothing happened, and maybe that’s why it’s also enough Petro Poroshenko behaved so aggressively towards Russian journalists
Valentin Filippov: Well, I don’t know, the Ukrainian media have already lied so much... I don’t understand why they couldn’t report to Ukrainian viewers that the meeting took place. No one would have checked this anyway, and with the censorship that exists in Ukraine...
Marina Kim: I wouldn’t be surprised if we find a Ukrainian media outlet that describes in detail the meeting between Trump and Poroshenko
Valentin Filippov: Tell me, were there any repressions against you, not the antics of the Ukrainian side, but some kind of repressions in general provoked by the Ukrainian side, at Davos, for example, were there any other bans?
Marina Kim: You know, I can’t say that it’s “repression,” but the fact that they so harshly cut off the opportunity to approach the president... I quite calmly approached Donald Trump, Theresa May, and Emmanuel Macron. It seems to me that these are no less significant figures in world politics than Petro Poroshenko. But it was impossible to approach just one, and that was him.
Because no one walked with security inside the Convention Center. You have to understand that the security service of Davos, they have been for many years in a row... every journalist is examined under a microscope, they always track the history of your work. All admitted people inside are already chosen. And this is why Davos is both famous and popular, that in such an informal atmosphere you can communicate with such significant people. But why does Petro Poroshenko walk like this, cordoned off by security, and not make any contact... this is somehow undemocratic and not at all European. Looks like he's the president of some African...
Valentin Filippov: He is the leader of a power that fights for the entire civilized world.
Marina Kim: Yes, but you just need to understand the atmosphere of the forum. It’s precisely about the fact that very influential and powerful people, world leaders, not only are they without ties, but they are in such an informal atmosphere and it is because of this that most journalists strive there, so that in such an environment...
We spoke with CNN columnist Fareed Zakaria, and we all meet in a completely democratic way in a cafe, in a hallway, and this is the spirit that Davos values. It seems to me that Petro Poroshenko has not fully imbued with this spirit and, unfortunately, has not yet been able to take advantage of this luxury of communication. Everyone has access except him.
Valentin Filippov: Okay, Marina. Thank you very much. Or maybe he heard your name and thought that you were carrying nuclear weapons with you?
Marina Kim: He didn’t listen to anything, he just saw the microphone, saw “1TV Russia” on it, realized that these were Russian media, despite the fact that the correspondent speaks excellent English, and at that moment he tried to deal with the microphone
Valentin Filippov: Thank you so much, thank you for being so brave. Many would like to approach Poroshenko and say something.
Marina Kim: Well, that’s why... although we are competitors with the Russia-1 channel, we all act as a united front, because we are all Russian journalists, and what I think is completely unacceptable is how not even he, but his entourage treats to a journalist from the Russia channel when they shout something. This just completely violates business etiquette and is simply undignified towards a girl. This year it so happened that that girl was from Russia, and I was from Channel One, and we don’t give the impression of being particularly dangerous.
Valentin Filippov: And in Ukraine, people are jailed for a long time for such questions. It's called terrorism.
Marina Kim: You see how.
Valentin Filippov: So that's why thank you too
Marina Kim: Okay, if anything, please contact me, call.
Valentin Filippov: Okay, let's turn around.
Marina Kim: Goodbye.
Valentin Filippov: Happily.
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