Journalism and safety: How the war in Ukraine is full of danger

Maks Levin,

Maks Levin, theUkrainian journalist who was killed by a Russian missile.

Photo credit: Genya Savilov | AFP

 Since the start of the Russian offensive in Ukraine, Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has documented attacks directly targeting journalists wearing a “Press” armband, and has seen more and more of them killed or injured in the course of their duty. RSF, with other international media stakeholder’s, however, have asked Russian and Ukrainian authorities to guarantee journalists’ safety in accordance with international conventions.

Historically, people have written about wars for thousands of years. Herodotus’s account for the Persian wars is similar to war journalism.

Russian authorities have targeted foreign journalists covering the Ukraine war.

The first modern war correspondent is said to have been Dutch painter Willem Van de Velde, who in 1653 took to the sea in a small boat to observe a naval battle between Dutch and the English, of which he made sketches on the spot, which he later developed into one big drawing that added to a report he wrote to the State-General.

A further modernisation came with the development of newspapers and magazines. One of the earliest war correspondents was Henry Crabb Robinson, who covered Napoleon’s campaigns in Spain and Germany for The Times of London. William Hicks was another early correspondent whose letter describing the Battle of Trafalgar (1805) was also published in The Times. Winston Churchil in 1899, worked as a war correspondent.

War correspondents

However, early film newsreels and television news rarely had war correspondents because they simply collected footage provided by sources, often government, and news anchors would add narration. Until the introduction of small portable picture cameras during World War II, the situation had not changed.

The Crimean War, the Third Italian War of Independence, the Russo–Japanese War, the First and Second Balkan Wars, among others, including the First World War, were characterised by rigid censorship. British Lord Kitchener hated reporters, and they were banned from the front. Although the government accredited reporters in 1915, it controlled what they saw.

The Vietnam era war correspondence was marked differently from that of World War I and World War II, with more focus on investigative journalism and the discussion of the ethics surrounding the war and America’s role in it. Over 400 reporters the world over, especially from the United States, were dispatched to Vietnam, and 68 of these journalists were killed.

Maks Levin is the latest Ukrainian journalist to be found dead having been killed by a Russian missile. He worked as a documentary film and photographic editor for Reuters, Associated Press, BBC and Hromadske.

According to RSF, which monitors and updates on press violations on the ground on attacks on journalists and media outlets, a record is provided, for instance, that on February 26, 2022, two Danish reporters for Ekstra – Bladet, were badly injured by shots fired in Okhtyrka town. Two days later, a crew of British and Ukrainian journalists working with Sky News were shot at.

Kyiv Live TV channel

On March 1, Evgeny Sakun, a cameraman for the local Kyiv Live TV channel was killed when Russian missiles hit the Kyiv Television tower. The following day, three TV towers – in Khaskiv Korosten and Lysychansk were hit by Russian airstrikes. On March 3, two Czech journalists reporting for Voxpot with Central Television came under fire from Russian soldiers in Makariv near Kyiv, but none was injured. On March 4, shots were fired at a car marked “Presss” and “TV” being used by CNN Prima News in Yakovlivka village near Kharkiv.

On March 5, a crew working for the London-based Pan-Arab television channel Al-Araby Television - reporter Adnan Can and cameraman Habip Demirci - came under fire in Lupi, a Kyiv suburb. They found refuge with local residents and were unable to leave for the next four days because of heavy fighting there. On March 6, a second strike hit the Kharkiv Television tower. On that same day, Guillaume Briquet narrowly escaped death - wounded in the face and arm.

Victoria Roshchina, a Ukrainian reporting for independent TV channel Hromadske, was shot at when her car crossed a column of Russian tanks in Zaporizhzhia region. On that day, Russian soldiers stormed the Television tower in the city Berdiansk, which houses several media, including radio station Novostic Berdiansk, the Newspaper Berdianskiye Vedomosti and the television channel Young Television. The soldiers held around 50 journalists hostage for more than five hours and subjected them to physical violence for refusing to broadcast Kremlin propaganda.

The list continues to rise as war continues. Therefore, the grand question arises: Will the 21st Century war in Ukraine change war journalism?

Mr Martin Kurgat is a former student in the Soviet Union and a lecturer at Moi University’s Department of Publishing, Journalism and Communication Studies. [email protected]