Daryna Trunova - attack 22.10.2025

On October 22, 2025, TV-host Daryna Trunova from Channel 24 published a Facebook post about her friends’ son, Roman Sopin. The man had been taken by representatives of the Territorial Recruitment Center (TCC) and sent to a military medical commission. Sopin suffered a traumatic brain injury and died in the hospital.

On October 24, 2025, Channel 24’s YouTube channel released a report by Trunova about the situation, titled: “DEATH in the TCC! New details of the TRAGEDY. Hear what the MILITARY COMMISSION says. URGENT reaction.” She also shared the video on her Facebook page.

After trying to draw attention to this tragedy, Daryna Trunova faced a wave of online attacks from social media users. For example, a user named Oleksii Oskeer wrote a post calling Trunova “a fat wh*re and a TV host from Channel 24, or the shmarathon, hyping on the murder committed by TCC officers.”

In addition to posts and comments under her publications, unknown users began sending her private messages. In screenshots provided by the journalist, she is called “a microphone stand,” “a protozoa,” and “a propagandist from the national TV marathon.”

In a comment to Women in Media, Daryna Trunova explained: “Last week, before the death of my friends’ son, I recorded a comment from a representative of the Kyiv region TCC. We were trying to debunk myths around the TCC, and I asked him provocative questions to make him assess the so-called ‘busification.’ People twisted everything — as if I first defended the TCC, and now someone has assigned me to criticize them.”

In the comments, posts, and messages directed at Daryna Trunova, several forms of technology-facilitated gender-based violence (TFGBV) have been identified, including gendered defamation, sexism, disinformation, discreditation, victim-blaming, psychological intimidation, and online harassment.

The aim of these actions appears to be to undermine public trust in the journalist, devalue her voice in the public sphere, and create an atmosphere of fear that could push her toward self-censorship or force her to abandon her professional activities.