Probably, every one of us has their unique story about this horrible war. It seems that life before and after February 24th cannot be compared. On the other hand, though, this struggle of invincible Ukrainians that we all witness and participate in reminds of the struggle against tyranny and autocracy which eventually forced Yanukovych to flee. At least I can make such a comparison for myself. Maidan is only one of the relatively recent examples of this struggle for freedom which glorifies Ukrainians. We may go back in history, to different eras and periods and find many other examples. This struggle makes us who we are. In some way it’s a part of our genetic code. But let’s not go that far, I haven’t told anything about myself or this project and what we do here yet.
Yeah, my name is Vanya, I’m from Zhytomyr region, currently studying for the Master’s degree in Journalism at Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv. Prior to that, I studied at Taurida National V. I. Vernadsky University. During my third year, my groupmates, professors, and I founded the Platform of Student Journalism NGO. Its main goal is to make students’ voices heard in the media space in Ukraine and abroad through reports, interviews etc. Students are the main driving force of this platform and subsequently we created the website you are viewing right now – https://www.truthfulreporting.org/
Currently I am working on this website with the team, developing our social media, engaging new people to the community and sometimes I also publish my own writings. Everything was going great until the terrible war broke into our lives. When the full-scale invasion happened, our team decided to create the War Diary project, which would tell stories of our youth and their experience on resisting the Russian aggression. What inspires them to keep on creating and working despite the difficulties and challenges of war? That was the goal of this project and soon we had the opportunity to engage a great team of students from different parts of Ukraine and different universities to develop this project. These are young people of different interests from Ostroh University, Chernivtsi National University, Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv, who are united by one goal – to tell the truth about the war in Ukraine. This project is also translated in English, as it is extremely important to spread these stories abroad. Foreign audience is eager to hear them.
So far, our biggest success is to have received a grant from the Norwegian organisation Fritt Ord Foundation, which allows us to develop our project further. Two co-founders – Svitlana Kuzmina and Viktoriia Gumenyuk – had the opportunity to go to Norway in May of 2022 and visit different organizations which deal with journalism and media. Particularly, they visited Nobel Peace Prize Center in Oslo, the Norwegian-Ukrainian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, the Norwegian Press Association (like the Commission on Journalistic Ethics that we have) and many other places. They talked to Ukrainians who are living in Norway and went to rallies dedicated to Ukraine. Svitlana Kuzmina is the dean of the Institute of Philology and Journalism of Taurida National V. I. Vernadsky University, where I studied for four years. Viktoriia Gumenyuk is the head of the organization and a teacher at Taurida National V. I. Vernadsky University, and together we founded this War Diary project.
What my story during war was like
During the war I was at home, in my parent’s house in Zhytomyr region. I remember that a few days before the full-scale invasion my roommate in the dormitory warned me to be very vigilant as the war could begin the very next day.
Of course, at that time many Western media paid a lot of attention to the war, telling that it was only a matter of time when it would begin. Ukrainian media didn’t publish harsh statements that the war is about to start and there would be missile shellings. I’m not sure if such strategy was the best one. I spent all this time at home, and the first weeks and months were incredible difficult, to say the least. There was a lot of uncertainty, during many days and especially nights we heard explosions from missile strikes about 20-30 kilometres away (they were relatively far but it was still easy to hear). The town near me, Korosten, suffered great destructions, many houses were destroyed, many people were killed or seriously injured. Why do we suffer all this pain and deaths? Because of unsatisfied ambitions of the Kremlin billionaire oldster and his crazy, cruel and detached from reality ideas? Of course, it partly answers the question why it all is happening. But the answer is not that important, actually. Why? I know that every day I have to get up to do my work. I have to study, though it is really hard, time and energy consuming, especially in modern realities. At times I grab my head and think to myself: why do I have so many responsibilities? But I have to get up and just do it, this is my motivation. It’s important for me to bring something new into this world, something my own, which would have value and would be interesting to others. Currently, my main goal is to develop the War Diary project, the Truthful Reporting in general and future projects. Officially, War Diary as a grant project will end soon, but the topic of war will still be relevant for a long time. It will be with us, in our thoughts for many years. Sadly, this is our reality now. The war doesn’t have positive sides, I genuinely don’t understand those who can somehow glorify it or get pleasure from killing other people or entire nations. This is something wild for me.
However, while the war continues, we – the young journalists who just begin our thorny path in this field – should talk and write true stories about war and tell stories of other Ukrainians. The stories of their struggles, which we talked about at the very beginning.
A little bit about goals and tasks for the future
I look forward to further develop this platform. We’ve had great works and reports from the occupied parts of Ukraine, which I am proud of.
It is important to work on the projects dealing with the war. Not to sound too grandiose, but I consider it one of my life missions (though it probably does sound grandiose).
Kherson, Mariupol, deportations, refugees, missiles… This war evokes different associations and emotions in every one of us. I can remember the boy’s photo from Kherson region, who has lived many months under russians occupation and I assume was not happy about it.
During these nine months, the russians showed themselves in the worst possible way, both the military and ordinary people. Though, sometimes it is very difficult to call those who rape children and implement dozens of different methods of torturing the innocent as people. They deserve to suffer the greatest punishment for all the crimes committed on Ukrainian territory.
I understand, though, that the investigation can take years or even decades. Sometimes we see on news cases of condemnation of Nazi leaders who participated in the Holocaust, when over 70 years have passed since that time. So yes, this process takes time but I believe that justice will prevail. I am still optimistic and it inspires me, the way we continue to expel the enemy from our land, free another piece of our land every day, despite all the difficulties. We simply cannot lose.
We also have great pages on Facebook and Instagram. They were created recently, so please support us in social media.
Our Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100087892509506
Instagram pages
In Ukrainian: https://www.instagram.com/truthful_reporting/
In English: https://www.instagram.com/truthfulreporting.eng/
Translator: Zoriana Karpenko
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