KIEV (Sputnik) — Europe should create a Russian-language TV channel, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko said at a meeting with his Lithuanian counterpart Dalia Grybauskaite Saturday.
"We urgently need to create a trans-European Russian-language broadcasting channel. I suggested, and look forward to your support, that we extend it to Lithuania. It is important for people in Lithuania to understand what is happening, it is important to deliver an alternative position," Poroshenko was quoted as saying in a press release on the Ukraine's president website.
He also expressed readiness to send best Ukraine's journalists to Vilnius in order to assist in extension of channel's broadcasting coverage.
In December 2014, Latvian Foreign Minister Edgars Rinkevics said that Ukraine was trying to persuade the European Union to allocate funds for the creation of a European TV channel broadcasting in Russian.
Both Latvian and Lithuania have a large Russian-speaking audience. In particular, about 40 percent of Latvia’s citizens speak Russian. Baltic leaders have decided to find ways to provide the large ethnic Russian populations in their states with alternative sources of information amid the Ukrainian crisis and subsequent cold stance in Russia-West relations.
