Simon Ostrovsky, whose dispatches from Crimea and eastern Ukraine have been invaluable, has reportedly been captured by pro-Russian gunmen in Slavyansk. We have translated the announcement published on Gazeta.RU: The "People's mayor" of Slavyansk, Vyacheslav Ponomarev, said that the militia has taken the American journalist, Simon Ostrovsky, hostage, reports a correspondent for Gazeta.ru,

Ponomarev announced this during a press conference at the House of Culture in Slavyansk.



According to him, Ostrovsky has dual US and Israeli citizenship and works for the American publication, Vice.

The press conference was briefly interrupted when the journalists' parents rang Ponomarev, the leader of the Slavyansk militia, who gave assurances that their son was doing well.



"Nobody abducted him, nobody is holding him hostage, he's with us now in at the SBU, preparing material and working," said Ponomarev.

fetching tweet...

As we've been covering, several other journalists have been detained by gunmen in this city.