During the night of February 25-26, 2025, a Russian drone hit the house of Ukrainian journalist Tetyana Kulyk, editor-in-chief of the multimedia editorial department of state news agency Ukrinform, in the village of Kriukivshchyna, in the Kyiv region, killing Kulyk and her husband Pavlo Ivanchov, a surgeon and medical university professor, according to a Ukrinform report, statements by Ivanchov’s university and the local Institute of Mass Information (IMI) press freedom group. Their bodies were recovered later that day.
On the same day, Ukraine’s Prosecutor General’s Office announced the launch of an investigation under Parts 1 and 2 of Article 438 of the Ukrainian criminal code, which pertains to the “violation of the laws and customs of war.”
Kulyk was the author and host of a series of interviews, “Nation of the Invincible,” which focused on the resilience of Ukrainians during the Russia-Ukraine war.
“Tetyana Kulyk was a great journalist. She made many programs about our struggle and our heroes,” Ukrinform Director General Serhiy Cherevatyi said in a statement, adding, “We will avenge our colleague with materials that expose the war crimes of the aggressor.”
Cherevatyi told CPJ that Kulyk’s death was “yet another barbaric killing of an innocent civilian, our colleague,” and that “Russia must be held to account for each and every murder they commit.”
The Russian Defense Ministry did not respond to CPJ’s emailed request for comment.