How sanctions against Poroshenko and his associates will affect the media and support for the Armed Forces of Ukraine - Alexey Golobutsky.

The authorities are preparing for elections and are tightening their grip on the information landscape. The marathon monopolies are not enough. Even if in a limited format, other TV channels still exist – which means they can and will spread criticism of the government, at least in the standard electoral toolkit.

Therefore, it seems that the authorities have decided to restrict the informational capabilities of all competitors from another angle (the first being purely fiscal complications, which apply to everyone, not just media and their owners). Sanctions. They have been imposed not only based on the logic of political competition, as far as I can see. Those who maintain or could maintain alternative media to the marathon have been brought under sanctions.

This group includes Konstantin Zhevago, who has simply been "added" 13 years of sanctions. This suggests that the issue is likely not about money. And it is definitely not about treason (Zhevago is on the Kremlin's sanctions list, and he is not alone). It appears that this is how the authorities are cutting off major channels of criticism and electoral campaigning for any other political projects.

However, there is one point: Kremlin projects will not be affected (it is clear that Medvedchuk was added to the sanctions list with a single purpose: reputational, so that everyone else would simply end up "on the same list as Medvedchuk," and then let them prove that they are "not like that"). Thus, if things continue this way, there will be, as I mentioned before, two alternatives for voters: either the authorities' options or the Kremlin's. Parties, media – it does not matter. Although courts, due to violations of all laws in the application of sanctions and restrictive measures, may still manage to act before the elections.

But there is also a military aspect: almost every individual on the sanctions list is constantly financing the Armed Forces of Ukraine with significant sums. Zhevago is included as well. And the first thing that sanctions have definitely cut off is support. Do the authorities consider the military not statistically significant enough as an electoral group to take their discontent into account when it comes to the preventive cutting off of criticism channels?