Ukrainian media in crisis, Russia is trying to silence independent journalists
NEWS
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1 months ago
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Ukrainian media are in an information war, it was said at the "Balkan Disinfo 2025" conference being held in Pristina. The panel, which discussed Ukraine three years after Russia's aggression, among other things, emphasized that the media there is in crisis and that Russia is trying to silence independent journalists.
Sergiy Tomilenko from Kiev, who heads the national union of journalists of Ukraine, pointed out that supporting the media also means protecting democracy against aggression.
“The transformation of Ukraine’s media over the past three years has been problematic. Local media outlets have had to adapt to unprecedented challenges, from security to financial. Many have lost advertising revenue and have had to fundamentally restructure their operations or close them down entirely. This situation has become even more critical recently, as donor support has begun to dwindle three years after the invasion. Also, the sudden halt to media aid from the US has shaken the media community and left many independent media outlets struggling to survive. And this crisis threatens to do what Russian bombs cannot. And that is to silence the media, independent journalists in Ukraine.” he declared.
Lyudmila Makey is the first journalist from Ukraine to take refuge in Kosovo. She said in this panel that colleagues start the conversation every morning with the question "how are you today?".
"Not only in February 2022, the Russian aggression against Ukraine began in 2014, but Russia illegally annexed Crimea and Donbas. Since then, Ukrainians have been killed every day, and even today we see bombings in Kiev, attacks, shells and missiles. And Ukrainian colleagues, family members in Ukraine every morning start the conversation among themselves 'how are you today?' And the answer is 'good, we are alive'", she said.
At the "Balkan Disinfo 2025" conference, journalist Olena Churanova from "Stop FAKE.Org" spoke about the challenges of journalists, what she also called "information warfare".
"It's not just a war on the battlefield, it's also an information war. It's a point-to-point war, they're there every day, and it's not just bombings but also information attacks, and this is exhausting, tiring. And people are quite tired now. We can say that there is this fatigue among Ukrainians, and when they live in these conditions, it's easy to target them, and these narratives can be effective," she said.
Experts in this field from different countries around the world are participating in the "Balkan Disinfo 2025" conference, which is being held in Pristina. /KosovaPress
