Volodymyr Runets is on the Kremlin’s ‘black list’ of Ukrainian journalists. “The intelligence services have told me that I am one of their targets and that if they capture me they will execute me,” says this lanky thirtysomething war reporter whose Instagram, Facebook and Twitter accounts have just been hacked. Since February 24, he has lived in the ICTV newsroom in kyiv, a group that belongs to the oligarch Victor Pinchuk, and which has three offices in the capital. His new home is his office on the third floor. The workplace where he used to prepare his long-distance reports for the weekend news has been transformed into a makeshift shelter with a mattress on the floor, food and personal hygiene items.
One floor above, Julia Senyk, a star presenter with sun-yellow hair, gives the news of the day with the Russian advances in Mariupol and the latest speech by President Zelensky. This time she picks up her words addressed to the Israeli parliament, in a speech in which she told the deputies of the Jewish State that «I have the right to compare our history and yours, our war of survival and the Second World War ». The president also alluded to Golda Meir, the former prime minister of Israel, born in kyiv in 1898. There is little reference to the temporary outlawing of opposition parties. Zelenski accuses them of being close to Moscow and forces them to suspend their activity while martial law lasts.
Julia’s parents dreamed that she would continue the family tradition and study medicine, but she ended up in the Faculty of Information Sciences and is now one of the most anticipated faces in homes to learn about the progress of the war. The set is at the end of a large newsroom half empty of journalists. Up to 500 people used to work here.
Six minutes into the broadcast, an alert arrives. Don’t panic. Julia, the cameraman and the four journalists who were there get up and leave, but the news does not stop. The signal passes into the hands of Orest Drymalovsky, Julia’s partner who is in the building’s bunker. Ukrainian television broadcasts in a 24-hour format, without interruptions or advertising, and the seven major channels have joined in what they have dubbed a “marathon.” Every six hours they take over and this is the ICTV slot.
The war broke out on the 24th, but “we had been preparing for some time because after 2014 in Crimea and the situation in Donbas, we knew that something like this could happen,” Runets confesses. That preparation has included, among other things, the construction of an underground studio, where the set is in the middle of the bunker corridor and the central control in a nearby room. This has allowed them not to stop broadcasting since the beginning of hostilities, not even when Russia attacked the kyiv television and communications tower. They had prepared an alternative connection to the satellite and, in addition, the support of the YouTube channel. Three weeks after the attack, the antenna has been repaired and is working again.
“Horrible situation”
The set of Orets has nothing to do with that of Julia, who despite the seriousness of the situation even has hair and makeup before each newscast. The young presenter, in a suit and tie and a neat beard, sits on a low school chair with a desk in front of him where he has the computer. «We work from a shelter, I do not think that other presenters in the world live in the same situation, nor that other television stations have studios underground. It is a situation that this horrible attack by Vladimir Putin forces us to », he assures with a relaxed tone.
His work depends on Russian activity since every time a siren sounds, he has to resume the news. “It’s a bit cold, sometimes we have technical problems, but you have to make an effort because people need to be informed. We owe it to our viewers 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and that’s what we’re doing,” says Orets, who like the rest of his colleagues has also moved to live on television.
“It’s cold, sometimes we have technical problems, but you have to make an effort because people need to be informed”
When their turn comes, they close the huge blue metal door and there is silence. There is a cameraman is sitting in front of him. Behind it opens a long, dimly lit corridor with a national flag and there are dozens of mattresses for the chain’s staff who try to rest between shifts. impossible to disconnect
“We are Russian targets, but we are going to be here until the end. If they take kyiv we will have no choice but to leave, but until that last moment we will inform, “says Runets, who has also gone down to the basement like the rest of his colleagues. He began his work as a reporter during the Russian attack on Georgia in 2008 and since then the shadow of Moscow has followed him until he is now at the doors of the newsroom. He occasionally checks his phone in hopes of a resurrection on social media, but whoever deleted his accounts has done a good job and they’re still missing. Since the beginning of the war, the ‘hacking’ of journalists’ accounts has been a constant among the local press, especially, and the international press.
The sirens are silenced and the signal returns to the main set. In one or the other, the important thing is that the information signal remains on 24 hours a day and they plan to continue that way until the war allows it.
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