Invasion of Ukraine by Russia Places Journalists at Risk
Press organizations around the world demand that belligerents and international organizations guarantee their safety.
Reporters are on the frontlines of the Russian invasion, and they risk being hit by the missile strikes and shelling that are taking place throughout the country. Correspondents in some regions are afraid of being surrounded and not being able to escape. Many civilians are stranded in Kharkiv and Kherson, two cities in eastern Ukraine that would like to be evacuated.
The Ukrainian military, which issues accreditations, says there are more than 1,000 foreign correspondents on the ground in Ukraine alongside Ukrainian journalists.
According to the US government, the Kremlin has compiled a list of people who are "to be killed or sent to camps" as part of what it calls de-Nazification efforts in Ukraine. The list has not been named, but it is reported to include journalists.
Resolution 2222, enacted by the UN Security Council (which Russia is a permanent member of), and international humanitarian law require journalists to be protected as civilians during armed conflicts, even if they accompany military forces for the purposes of reporting. Between 2014 and 2016, ten journalists were killed in eastern Donbass during the height of the conflict.
Information is another front in this conflict. Cyber-attacks have been launched on at least two Ukrainian media outlets – the website of Kanal 5, an English-language TV channel owned by former President Petro Poroshenko, and the Kyiv Post, a newspaper owned by former official Adnan Kivan.
Russian authorities censor information about the "special operation" currently underway. Roskomnadzor, the Russian regulator of media freedom, has warned the media it might be prosecuted for spreading false information if it does not rely on information it receives from official Russian sources.
Putin, in his speech three days ago, held the Ukrainian government responsible for any incursion Russia might make into Ukraine. The Kremlin is in essence continuing the narrative it developed in recent weeks.
In RSF's 2021 World Press Freedom Index, Russia is ranked 150th out of 180 countries, while Ukraine is ranked 97th.
