Last week, German pubcaster ZDF aired a live news report from Russian-occupied Ukrainian city of Mariupol which focused on "the rebuilding" of the town, while failing to recognize that Mariupol was completely demolished by the Russian army and thousands of civilians were killed by the occupiers.

Ukraine's Foreign Ministry spokesperson Oleh Nikolenko reacted: "We call on ZDF to provide an official explanation. Violating Ukraine's laws may impact the media's further work in Ukraine," Nikolenko said on the social media platform X.

Armin Coerper, the ZDF Moscow bureau chief who visited Mariupol, said he and his team had to receive documents from Russia to access the site.

"I would like to make it very clear that this does not mean that we recognize this occupation by Russia," Coerper stressed on ZDFheute.

Coerper said that the ZDF team was able to move around Mariupol freely and talk to locals.

"Mariupol is not a ghost town, I want to make that clear," the journalist said.

"There are new books and new curricula in schools. The history lessons, of course, all of this now follows the Russian narrative."

While saying that the majority of the local population appears pro-Russian, the journalist added that "if there are still people in this city who are pro-Western, then they are probably much more reserved and may also fear reprisals if they talk to us."

Nikolenko commented on ZDF's report that "distorting reality is not journalism."

In an editor's note to ZDF's report written on Jan. 30, the channel said that "Moscow bureau chief Armin Coerper traveled to Mariupol as a journalist to get an independent picture of the situation in the territories occupied in violation of international law."

"In its reporting from Ukraine, ZDF never left any doubt that Mariupol is territory illegally occupied by Russia and who is the aggressor and victim in this war."

ZDF was also harshly criticized by the German viewers for airing a "fake news" report. However, the channel never reacted to the criticism officially.

The German pubcaster only provided comments to FOCUS online following a journalistic request: " ZDF takes criticism of the reporting from Mariupol seriously. The Moscow studio director Armin Coerper traveled to Mariupol to get an independent picture of the situation in the territories occupied in violation of international law as a journalist. He reports on the city, which was completely destroyed by the Russian war of aggression and its forced Russification."

However, there was no apology to Ukraine. ZDF only admitted that Coerper's formulation that “the city works” was “misunderstanding”. “Singling out this quote alone only gives an abbreviated impression of the impression described,” said a ZDF spokesman.