[1] According to The Washington Post, "her name became synonymous with hot-spot journalism", and her crew became known as "the bravest, brashest and most professional reporters on the scene".

After the first of Masyuk's reports showing the violence in Chechnya, Deputy Prime Minister Oleg Soskovets attempted to revoke NTV's license to broadcast in retaliation.

[4] Beginning on 13 July 1995, the attorney general's office of Russia formally investigated Masyuk under Article 189 of the Criminal Code (harboring a criminal) and Article 190 (failure to report a crime),[4] but the case was dropped in August 1995 after the acting attorney general of Russia Alexey Ilyushenko was forced to resign on 8 October 1995 for unrelated corruption charges.

[2][5][6][7][8][a] Vladimir Zhirinovsky, founder of the strongly nationalist Liberal Democratic Party of Russia, accused Masyuk in 1996 of being on the payroll of Chechen separatists.

[1] However, she persuaded her editor to allow her to cover a rally in the Chechen capital of Grozny and conduct an interview with rebel commander Salman Raduyev.

[17] Masyuk later commented that she felt the kidnappings had been tactically foolish by the rebels in terms of public image: "Chechens made $16 million on journalists last year, but they lost much more ...