President's Office outlines changes to communication with journalists

The President's Office is introducing a new framework for Volodymyr Zelenskyi's communication with journalists. Now, the President's foreign meetings will be followed by briefings. The changes cover not just protocol filming, but also the approach to journalists and Zoom calls with media representatives in Kyiv, the President's communications advisor Dmytro Lytvyn reports to Detector Media.

According to Lytvyn, the new framework was introduced during the President's foreign visits due to a demand for more communication, as well as the need to clarify certain things. The first Zoom call was held during a visit to the United Arab Emirates, and at the Munich Conference, the media were invited to the meeting room for the first general briefing.

Dmytro Lytvyn added that the President's Office had recently introduced briefings and regular invitations to the media during foreign guests' visits to Kyiv.

“The President is also preparing another format for working with the media in Kyiv and will likely implement it after returning from this trip,” he specified.

He noted that the communication framework used in Munich was not practiced by other delegations, “but turned out well.”

“And now there was the visit to the UAE, a lot of different things reported by the media in the US and other parties globally, a lot of questions, so the President decided to try to hold a Zoom call with journalists based in Kyiv so that they also receive information and answers, and not just the journalists who will be, say, in Turkiye tomorrow,” the presidential advisor emphasized.

Lytvyn also explained how the journalist rotation will work.

“In terms of invitations to journalists things are very simple: we want different groups of the audience to be represented. For example, today we invited Ukrainian and international media, sometimes we invite news agencies such as Interfax or UNIAN, there are also new media outlets like Grunt, and Radio Liberty has already been to post-visit briefings, and others, too, I believe,” the presidential advisor said.

He asked media professionals to contact the head of the Information Policy Directorate of the President's Office, Iryna Pobedonostseva, to participate in events or interviews with the President.

“We ask media professionals to let Iryna Pobedonostseva know that they are in Ukraine or are interested in participating in events or taking interviews. Then we invite them so that the President has access to different audience groups and so that the list of participants keeps changing,” Lytvyn stressed.

In November 2024, Ukrainska Pravda reported that the President's communications advisor Dmytro Lytvyn was discouraging people from talking with their journalists, giving in interviews or participating in events by the media outlet. Lytvyn then responded, saying that he did not want to “play these games” because “this story is very vague” and thus “refuting it in any meaningful way is impossible.”