The war in Ukraine forced many independent journalists from Ukraine, Russia and Belarus to stop working and flee to safer locations; others in Ukraine never made it that far before being imprisoned by Russian forces or killed in the fighting, according to interviews with journalists and media advocacy organizations.
Of the 15 Ukrainian journalists who have died in the war, six of those deaths are being investigated to determine whether the victims were targeted because of their journalism.
One of the latest, in late April, was Vira Hyrych, 54, a reporter for the U.S.-funded Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, whose death in a Russian air strike of her Kyiv apartment is one of those under investigation.
The same month, Yevhenii Bal, 78, died after three days of severe beatings by Russian forces who knew he was a journalist, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists, a U.S.-based press advocacy organization. He served as a submarine officer in both the Ukrainian and Soviet navies.
The month before, Russian troops stormed the house of Ria-Melitopol editor Svetlana Zalizetskaya in the southeastern Ukrainian city of Melitopol and kidnaped her 75-year-old father, according to news reports. They said they would exchange him for her. Her father was released days later when Zalizetskaya gave up her publication and published a statement confirming the transfer of its management to unstated third parties.
At least seven journalists who fled Belarus and relocated to Ukraine for their own safety the year before the invasion of Ukraine have been forced to evacuate again to other countries, according to Capital News Service interviews with the seven.
Meanwhile, in Russia, independent outlets are closed, their journalists forced to stop reporting or face imprisonment. A tiny group, however, have stayed and moved their operations to personal YouTube channels which have not been censored by authorities. One of those is Tatyana Felgengauer, host and deputy editor-in-chief of the widely respected liberal Echo of Moscow, which was forced to shut down in March.
“I'm staying because… I want to see how this all ends,” Felgengauer told Capital News Service in a recent interview.
“We, like a radio, were turned off the air. They just turned the switch. Without warning, without anything,” she said. “It's just a minority here… This was also such a process, very painful, very painful. A huge number of journalists left.”
The Russian Embassy in Washington did not respond to requests for comment about its crackdown on media in Russia and allegations that it had killed 13 journalists in Ukraine.
UKRAINIAN JOURNALISTS
In addition to the 15 deaths, at least five journalists have been detained in Ukraine by Russian forces or pro-Russian militia, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists. The latest was Iryna Danilovich, a local freelancer in Russian-occupied Crimea who went missing in late April and was found by her lawyer on May 11 in a pre-detention center in Simferopol.
While the Russian invasion has intensified the danger for Ukrainian journalists, many have worked in war-like conditions since 2014, when Russia invaded Crimea and also launched military operations with separatist militias in the eastern Donbas region.
“Bulletproof vests are common attributes of Ukrainian journalists since the occupation of Crimea,” said Dmytro Yevchyn, a Ukrainian journalist with Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty’s Ukrainian-language service.
The Embassy of Ukraine in Washington said did not respond to repeated requests for comment on the safety of journalists currently working in Ukraine.
BELARUS
Barys Haretski took refuge in Ukraine in 2021 after the Belarusian Association of Journalists was shut down and President Alexander Lukashenko, the self-proclaimed “last dictator” of Europe, threatened to imprison what few independent journalists remained. Like many of his colleagues who also fled to Ukraine, the war forced Haretski to relocate once more.
“It is very unpleasant when you are deprived of your home for the second time,” Haretski told CNS. “But the most important thing is that we saved our lives, health, and now many of us continue to do something for Ukraine.”
On Feb. 13, 2021, the day Belarus authorities threatened to take away her young daughter, Oksana Dobriyanets, a reporter for Polesie, a regional Belarusian media organization, fled to Kyiv with the child. When they landed one hour later, Dobriyanets discovered a criminal charge had already been filed against her.
When Russia invaded Ukraine a year later, Dobriyanets and her 8-year-old daughter were on the move again. They got a ride to the Ukrainian-Polish border, where they walked 9 miles, then waited five hours to cross the border.
She said the war has taken its toll on her daughter. “She is very nervous. She saw a lot of horrors. She heard explosions. She was simply driven to hysterics by all this and asked me all the time, ‘Mom, please get me out of here quickly, because I'm afraid that we're all going to die here,’ ” Dobriyanets told CNS.
Most Belarusian journalists now work out of Poland, Lithuania and Georgia, according to interviews.
“One thing is for sure: This is Russia's undisguised aggression, and the world will no longer be as it was before,” Valiantsin Stefanovich, deputy chairman of the Minsk-based Human Rights Center Viasna told CNS by email.
The Embassy of Belarus in Washington did not respond when asked about its media crackdown and Dobriyanets’ allegations.
RUSSIA
On March 4, Russia’s parliament passed a law prohibiting the spread of “fake news” about Russia’s military actions in Ukraine, a crime punishable by up to 15 years in prison. Besides Echo of Moscow, the last independent television broadcaster, TV Rain (Dozhd), also closed. In protest, the staff live-streamed its decision as they walked off the set.
Most independent Russian journalists have relocated to Georgia, Turkey, Latvia and other parts of Europe, according to interviews. Foreign news outlets also closed, leaving the media in Russia in government hands.
“Unfortunately, journalism no longer exists in the Russian Federation as a profession. For how long, it remains unclear,” Irina Babloyan, former radio host at Echo of Moscow, told CNS.
Like her colleague Felgengauer, Babloyan now hosts shows on a Youtube site, which Russia does not consider to be media, she said. The journalists are not paid and are careful not to use the word “war,” which is forbidden by the Kremlin, to describe the war in Ukraine.
Babloyan said she decided to stay in Russia for fear of becoming “disconnected from reality.”
“I am very much afraid of this: that, having left, I will lose contact with people in this country, and that I stop feeling the atmosphere and stop feeling this kind of fear of the people,” she said.
Still, she knows the risks. “It's dangerous to be a journalist,” she said. “Let's put it this way…you can do something, but it’s not a fact that they won’t come for you the next day.”