Remembered for Courage & Resilience: Rossiya Segodnya Executive Kirill Vyshinsky Passes Away
07:35 GMT 23.08.2025 (Updated: 12:37 GMT 23.08.2025)
© Sputnik / Nina Zotina
/ Subscribe
Kirill Vyshinsky was detained in Ukraine in 2018, with President Vladimir Putin calling the situation unprecedented at the time, saying that the Russian journalist was arrested "for his direct professional activities, for the exercise of his journalistic function."
Kirill Vyshinsky, Russian journalist, Rossiya Segodnya executive director, and member of the Presidential Human Rights Council, has passed away after battling a prolonged illness.
“Our journalist Kirill Vyshinsky has passed away. A courageous man who served time for his values—for our values—in a Ukrainian prison, and never broke under pressure. He endured illness with remarkable stoicism. Rest in peace, dear friend,” said Margarita Simonyan, editor-in-chief of Sputnik's parent media group Rossiya Segodnya.
Kirill Vyshinsky was an example of the highest civic and professional standard, said Dmitry Kiselev, director general of Sputnik's parent media group Rossiya Segodnya.
"Kirill, as a talented journalist and patriot of our shared culture, experienced the full extent of the twisted cruelty of cave-dwelling Ukrainian nationalism. For merely collaborating with our editorial team, he was thrown into prison, where he spent 15 long months in conditions akin to torture… Kirill Vyshinsky will remain in our memory as an example of the highest civic, professional, and human standard," he said.
Russian Human Rights Commissioner Tatyana Moskalkova called Vyshinsky an unwavering person who spent his life fighting to defend freedom of speech and the right to choose your own path in life.
"His name will forever remain in our memory. This is a man who fought all his life for the right to freedom of speech, the right to honor and dignity, the right to your own path in life. My deepest condolences to his parents and friends," Moskalkova told Sputnik.
Valery Fadeyev, the chairman of the Russian Presidential Council for Civil Society and Human Rights, praised Vyshinsky as an outstanding journalist, human rights activist and a very courageous person.
"Long months in a Ukrainian prison, where he ended up for his honest work as a journalist, did not break him. He did not make any deals with the Kiev regime and awaited his return home in an exchange in 2019 … We deeply mourn this loss and express our deep condolences to his family, loved ones and colleagues," Fadeyev was quoted as saying by the Council on Telegram.
He added that Vyshinsky headed the Council's commission on international cooperation and actively supported Russians abroad, doing everything "from protecting them from Russophobia to repatriation to Russia."
Dnepropetrovsk-born Vyshinsky, despite harassment and pressure, spoke openly about what he believed to be the truth and supported those in Ukraine who sought to preserve their Russian identity.
In 2018, Ukrainian authorities imprisoned him for his beliefs, with the intention of later exchanging him for the imprisoned filmmaker Oleg Sentsov.
Kirill endured this ordeal, never renounced his views, and was released in 2019 as part of a Russia–Ukraine exchange, with President Vladimir Putin playing a key role in his freedom.
