The Ukrainian national chapter of the Council of Europe "Journalists Matter" Campaign for the Safety of Journalists is being launched in Kyiv on 9 April during the roundtable "Safety of journalists and other media actors in Ukraine in the context of martial law". The event is organised by the Ministry of Culture and Information Policy of Ukraine with the support of the Council of Europe Project "Safeguarding Freedom of Expression and Freedom of Media in Ukraine" in the framework of the "Journalists Matter" campaign.
As a first step of the implementation of the campaign in Ukraine, the Ministry of Culture and Information Policy, which has been assigned by the Government of Ukraine as a national focal point for the campaign, will carry out a national consultation with a diverse array of stakeholders to identify strategies for protecting journalists and upholding media freedom in the country. Participants in the round table will address the main challenges faced by Ukrainian media and journalists in times of war and the situation of the media in the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine. Other objectives are to assess the current state of play in the investigation of crimes against journalists and ways to enhance the existing legal safeguards on the safety of journalists and other media actors in Ukraine.
Speakers at the opening include Yaroslav Yurchyshyn, Head of the Freedom of Expression Committee of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine; Matjaz Gruden, Director of Democracy and Human Dignity of the Council of Europe; Taras Shevchenko, Deputy Minister of Culture and Information Policy for European Integration of Ukraine, and Ilarion Pavliuk, Head of Press and Information Department of the Ministry of Defence of Ukraine. The event will be live streamed on YouTube (CET 12h00 to 16h30, EET 13h00 to 17h30).
