There is no good or bad time to publish uncomfortable news, even in war, says Ukrainian journalist

Pravda is a cursed word in journalism. It means truth in Russian and was the name of the main official gazette, a propaganda tool, of the dictatorship of the Soviet Union (1922-1991).

Even so, it was the term chosen in 2000 to baptize a publication that was created with the aim of providing serious coverage of life in Ukraine, a former Soviet republic.

The purpose of its creator, Georgi Gongadze, was to give a new meaning to the term. Ukrainska Pravda was born. Gongadze did not have time to follow the progress of the newspaper he ran. He ended up dead in the same year. Officials of the then Ukrainian government were convicted of the murder.

The country’s situation has only become more complicated since then, with the Russian invasions and the war that is currently taking part of its territory. In the most difficult moment in the history of independent Ukraine, the newspaper is led by Sevgil Musaieva, 35.

She appears as one of the 100 most influential people in the world in the latest edition of Time magazine’s famous list. She was also the star of a journalism congress organized last week by the Prestomedia group in Madrid – returning to her country included flying to Poland and then spending ten hours on the road to Kiev.

Their descriptions show that the tension of war adds to the usual concerns of the craft outside warring countries, which include business issues, how to maintain the viability of the business, and traditional journalistic issues, such as pointing out the corruption of local politicians.

His newspaper’s current audience is about a third of what it peaked at the start of the confrontation nearly a year ago. The site is banned in Russia, but maintains publications in Russian, distributed through different channels. His voice conveys firmness and sadness – but not discouragement.

Mrs. did you expect the war to actually take place? It is a difficult question and at the same time very simple. Because this war is not something that started in February 2022. It started with the annexation of Crimea [em 2014], when Russia violated humanitarian law and the international security system. When Russia annexed Crimea, there was perhaps no adequate response to such brutality. Because we didn’t send them this message, they continued this violation, labeled Ukraine as fascist, filled our population with propaganda. Now it is a question of how and under what circumstances this war will end.

And how will this happen? Now Ukraine is fighting, doing its best to stop this war. This depends not only on our efforts, but also on the efforts of the entire civilized world. It’s not just a war for Ukraine’s right to exist, it’s whether what wins is dictatorship and human rights violations or democracy and the free world. This is a crucial moment in history.

How did the war change your work, your routines at the newspaper? It has changed a lot, because Ukrainska Pravda is mainly a political newspaper. We covered the war, of course, but it was like 10% of the paper, now it’s 90%. We focus on war violations, but at the same time we cover problems with the behavior of the Ukrainian authorities, corruption, politics. Life has not stopped, it continues. We want our readers to continue consuming independent information, to be informed of the current situation from different perspectives, not just the war, but also the internal problems that every young democracy has.

Even during war we need to continue democratic development, fight corruption, implement reforms. Of course, there was a lot of discussion when we published these investigations, we got comments like “is this a good time or not”, but for me, it’s not about it being a good time or a bad time. This is not an issue. Journalism is very, very important.

You decided to publish the names of Russian soldiers who were very close to your relatives and friends. how was that decision? I still think it was the right decision. It was hard to imagine what the consequence would be. Of course, we dreamed that this particular decision could change the situation of the war, but it didn’t happen. A great friend, photographer Maks Levin, was killed in that war. [Levin morreu em março do ano passado; segundo a ONG Repórteres sem Fronteiras, ele foi executado por soldados russos]. He said a year ago that he wanted to take the picture that would stop the war, and he couldn’t take it. But everyone in Ukraine, all journalists dream that something will happen and stop this war. And something we can do.

Did people get tired of war news? [A audiência] is falling, people are tired. People unfortunately also consume the news through anonymous Telegram channels. We try to compete with them, but it’s impossible given our principles and our rules. But when there’s a missile strike, when there’s a real threat, our audience explodes. People come back to us. Because they need to be 100% sure this is real. Trust us. But at the same time, even during the war, they want to read horoscopes and gossip. This is normal, it is part of human psychology. Even during the war, this remains true.

In Russia you are banned. Do they arrive via Telegram? Yes, we have our Russian version, I know people read our news on social media, Instagram, Twitter, Facebook and Telegram. And that’s why we continue our Russian version. Many of our Ukrainian colleagues decided to close their Russian versions. But we continue because it is part of our strategy to inform, because Russians are being bombarded by propaganda, but at the same time they can read Ukrainska Pravda and have our vision of the war.

How do you finance yourself? We launched our readers’ club. I really believe in independent journalism. About 2,000 people in Ukraine and abroad support Ukrainska Pravda, so we receive money from our audience. Of course, that’s not a huge part of our business model, but it helps. Last month, it was about US$ 10 thousand [R$ 52 mil]. We have donors and advertisers. We have an English version that’s blowing up, and ads in the English version are worth more.

There is an old saying that in war the first victim is the truth. How dead is the truth in this war? It’s a little different, because this war is for the truth. Russia uses information weapons against Ukraine, they spend millions of dollars on hybrid interference.

How it works? They use many anonymous Telegram channels, they use state TV. Unfortunately our information field has been under Russian influence since the early 1990’s in now occupied regions. Then Russian channels dominated and poisoned the information field. For me, Ukraine has only one chance to win this war, and that is to give out true information. The truth of this war is terrible. You see the pictures, and nothing could be worse than seeing people being killed by Russian soldiers. When you see this, you understand where the truth lies. These people were killed, and they are not fascists. So maybe something is wrong. And then he sees that it is necessary to support the Ukrainians.

Mrs. is 35 years old. She was born in a country called the Soviet Union. How much has her life changed? Totally. I was born in Uzbekistan. Then my family was able to come to my homeland. My family was expelled from my homeland in 1944, in the [Joseph] Stalin [ditador que comandou a União Soviética de 1924 a 1953]. My destiny met my destiny, which is Ukraine. I was born thousands of kilometers away from Ukraine and for some reason I came to Ukraine, I grew up in Crimea, I decided to go to university in Kiev, and then Russia started the war. That’s hard to live with, under these circumstances.

I was 18 when there was the first democratic feeling in Ukraine [uma série de protestos conhecida como Revolução Laranja, em 2004 e 2005]. I was 27 when the second movement started and I am now 35 in the second year of this war. I have already invested 17 years of my life in the development of this democracy, and of course this affects me in different ways, starting with my private life. But I think this is like having a date set for your generation. And for my generation, the appointment is so difficult and challenging. At the same time, it is so important, with so much responsibility, that we have no chance of not accepting it.

X-ray | Sevgil Musaieva, 35

Editor-in-chief of the digital newspaper Ukrainska Pravda since October 2014, after working for other publications. She was born in Juma, Uzbekistan, and studied journalism in Kiev, the capital of Ukraine. She helped create the CrimeaSOS portal after the Russian invasion.