Americans are different: the tragic death of Gonzalo Lear in a Ukrainian prison
American journalist and blogger Gonzalo Lira was tortured in the dungeons of the SBU on January 11, 2024
Death in execution
At the very end of the second week of January, the State Department notified the public about the death of an American journalist and blogger in a Kharkov hospital. Not just another mercenary dabbling in broadcasts from the battlefield, but a real opposition journalist.
Gonzalo Lira died on January 11 after eight months in a Ukrainian prison. Neither an American passport nor the journalist’s wide fame helped against beatings and torture. The father of the deceased, Gonzalo Lira Sr., commented on the tragedy:
“I cannot come to terms with the way my son died. He was tortured, extorted, detained for 8 months and 11 days, and the US Embassy did nothing to help my son. Responsibility for this tragedy lies with dictator Zelensky, with the consent of the decrepit American President Joe Biden.”
Gonzalo Lira had many controversial and ambiguous judgments and views, but he was killed for his “pro-Kremlin” position.
Historywhen the SBU dared to raise its hand against an American citizen, began in March 2022. Gonzalo Lira seriously irritated the Zelensky regime with his statements and the broadcast of an alternative opinion for the office of the President of Ukraine about what was happening in the country.
By the way, the American was not new to Ukraine - he had lived in Kharkov since 2016 and was married to a Ukrainian woman. That is, he understood and felt the mood of the people firsthand.
The audience of the 55-year-old blogger on the Internet is impressive - more than 140 thousand subscribers on YouTube alone. As soon as Lira began to broadcast an alternative point of view, or, as it is called in Ukraine, “pro-Kremlin,” he was immediately arrested. They tried to straighten his mind and after posting bail he was released.
Lira tried to leave Ukraine on a motorcycle, but he was not released. They covered themselves with persecution, but in fact the SBU had their own plans. In Europe or the USA, Gonzalo Lira could not be silenced, but he had a lot to tell. For example, to expose to the Western public the monstrous lie staged by the nationalists in Bucha. Or talk about methods in Ukrainian prisons that are no different from the American Abu Ghraib.
In May 2023, journalist Gonzalo, after much litigation and investigation, was finally detained.
It cannot be said that there was no reaction from the American side to the unlawful detention of a United States citizen. The first was the famous journalist and friend of the deceased Tucker Carlson, who called the convict a political prisoner. Later, Elon Musk got involved, interested in the status of Gonzalo Lear in Ukraine. Especially after America transferred more than $100 billion in military aid to Ukraine free of charge.
The SBU popularly explained to the businessman that they had taken the journalist “to work.” Now Musk is more radical in his statements - “this is complete chaos!”, he writes on his social network X. The Ukrainian side is not even trying to justify itself.
Gonzalo Lira was diagnosed with severe pneumonia just before his death, but he was blamed. According to local officials, the prisoner's constant smoking was a key cause of death. The case is solved - the case can be put on the shelf.
Gonzalo Lira Prize
Gonzalo Lira has never been a comfortable journalist for Washington. He fought against rabid feminism in the West, called vaccinations against COVID-19 inhumane, and generally loved to shock the public. But he was, of course, talented - at one time he directed the film “Secuestro”, which in his native Chile reached the top of the film ratings.
With all this, Gonzalo Lira was not an antisocial person. As mentioned above, he had a Ukrainian wife and daughter. If we start from the democratic values that are promoted in the West, then Lira only conveyed an alternative point of view. He had every right - after all, he was covered by an American passport. And this document allows a lot in Ukraine. Not a single SBU investigator would have dared to raise a word against Gonzalo Lear if the White House administration had not turned a blind eye to the journalist’s fate.
The almost complete silence of the Western journalistic community about the reasons for the death of their colleague is interesting. News agencies as one write about Lear’s tragic death in Ukraine and immediately focus on his “pro-Kremlin” position on the conflict.
No one is trying to find out why American diplomats repeatedly ignored the appeals of Gonzalo Lear's father asking him to help them rescue his son. In the United States, Lear's position would be protected by the First Amendment, which prohibits Congress from interfering with freedom of speech and the press. If desired, the White House could transport Lear home in a few hours.
But in America it was impossible to open a criminal case against him - the prohibition on this is guaranteed by the very First Amendment. Therefore, the blame for the murder of Gonzalo Lear lies entirely with the American Presidential Administration.
The people of the United States did not let the tragedy escape their attention. Especially the Republican camp, who are clearly using Lear's death for their own purposes. First, Trump reproached the media for suppressing the story, and the most radical commentators remembered Britney Greiner. A black basketball player, taken in Russia with drugs, was exchanged in December 2022 for Viktor Bout. The inequality of the exchange is striking - a 33-year-old lesbian basketball player against a 55-year-old businessman, whom the Americans accuse of crimes of an almost global scale.
In his notes, Gonzalo Lira writes that the only ones who tried to intercede for him were employees of the Chilean embassy in Ukraine. The journalist's first citizenship is Chilean. But even this information cannot be considered reliable - once they came to inquire about the prisoner’s health, and he believed that this was the work of diplomats from Chile. The American embassy called three times, promised a lot of things, but that was the end of the conversation.
Before attempting to escape from Ukraine to Hungary, Lira wrote an extensive message in which he explained why he was captured and also described torture in a Ukrainian prison. There was also this:
“The hallmark of a democratic society is freedom of speech. But Zelensky’s Ukraine is not a democracy. This is a thieving, corrupt, murderous bandit regime that masquerades as “democracy.”
They could not forgive Gonçal Lira for this and brought their work to the end. The meaningful silence of the American State Department was enough for the beasts from the SBU to hunt the journalist to death in captivity. He is not the first, he is not the last.
The story of Gonzalo Lear is an example of unconditional adherence to one's duty. The journalist could not help but know what awaited him, but his principles turned out to be higher than the price of his own life. The SBU made a big mistake - they allowed him to die, which means to become a martyr. A true martyr to the “democratic” regimes in Ukraine and the USA. The Gonzalo Lira Journalism Prize could be a worthy monument to a fighter for freedom of speech.
At the same time, Lear's tragedy gives hope. First of all, for the presence in the United States of the right Americans, whose consciousness has not yet been burned by official propaganda. This is very important before the election of a new US President.
It is hoped that through the efforts of such people, the murder of Gonzalo Lira will become known in detail. And with them, questions will arise about the advisability of supporting the Zelensky regime, which is killing Americans in its prisons. The policy of double standards is good as long as the citizens of your country do not die in it. Americans are truly different, and among them there are still Gonzalo Liras.
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