IMI media expert to students: Safety comes first for a journalist working on the frontline

Oleksandr Ruban (left) with colleagues and a press officer. Donetsk oblast, 2023. Photo by Orest Firmaniuk on Facebook

A journalist working on the battlefield assesses risks and works to minimize them, because there is always a danger of enemy drones, shelling, landmines, shifts in the frontline situation, etc., stressed Oleksandr Ruban, a media expert with the Institute of Mass Information, while giving an online lecture on reporting from combat areas to students of the Education and Research Institute of Journalism at the Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv.

During the lecture, the IMI media expert talked about:

• possible risks (shelling, landmines, no GPS, etc.) while working on the frontline;
• assessing risks (to life and health, filming interruptions, etc.) and minimizing them;
• route planning;
• the danger of group thinking;
• working on the ground, etc.

"Before taking a trip to a combat zone, you have to do a lot of planning. For instance, you need to know where all the hospitals nearest to your route and the spot where you will be working are located. It could save your life or that of your colleagues. On the ground, one should remember that it is better to park your car, say, under some trees, so that Russian drones won't notice it. The car must always be ready to take off. At shooting locations, the crew should mark possible hiding spots to take cover from Russian shelling," says Oleksandr Ruban.

Natalia Zhelikhovska, head of the Department of Print Media and History of Journalism at the Taras Shevchenko KNU, notes that amidst Russia's full-scale aggression against Ukraine, future media workers must know about the safety aspects of reporting from the battlefield.

"Thank you to Oleksandr Ruban from the Institute of Mass Information for an interesting lecture for the students of the Education and Research Institute of Journalism at the Taras Shevchenko KNU about the work of journalists on the frontlines. The lecture was made informative and helpful by the stories from personal experience and practical risk minimization advice for journalists," says Natalia Zhelikhovska.

The Institute of Mass Information (IMI) is a Ukrainian public media organization that has been operating since 1996. The IMI defends the rights of journalists, analyzes the media field and covers media-related events, fights propaganda and disinformation and has been providing media outlets with safety gear for trips to the combat zone since the start of the Russo–Ukrainian war in 2014.

The IMI carries out Ukraine's only freedom of speech monitoring and keeps a list of high quality and sustainable online media outlets, documents Russia's crimes against the media committed in the course of the war on Ukraine. The IMI has representatives in 20 oblasts of Ukraine and a network of "Mediabaza" hubs to provide journalists with continuous support. The IMI's partners include Reporters Without Borders and Freedom House; the organization is a member of the International Organization for the Protection of Freedom of Expression (IFEX).