(Photo shows Denis Pushilin, leader of the separatists in the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic, speaking to journalists in Ukraine’s port city of Mariupol on May 18, 2022. Credit: Olga Maltseva/AFP) 
A Russian soldier guards an area as international journalists tour a steel plant in Mariupol as part of a trip organized by the Russian Ministry of Defense on May 18, 2022. Credit: AP Photo 
Journalists report inside a destroyed warehouse for storing food, after an attack from Russia twelve days ago in Brovary, on the outskirts of Kyiv, Ukraine on March 29, 2022. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd) 
Journalists take pictures of a soldier during a press tour near the front line in Brovary, on the outskirts of Kyiv, Ukraine on March 28, 2022. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd) 
Journalists work near buildings damaged in a military strike in Kyiv, on March 23, 2022. (Reuters/Serhii Nuzhnenko)
Russia’s war on Ukraine is stretching into its fourth month, with the conflict taking an escalating toll on the country. More than 7.5 million people have fled across Ukraine’s borders and more than seven million have been internally displaced since Russia launched a full-scale invasion of the country in early February.
At least 12 journalists covering the war in Ukraine have been killed, and CPJ is investigating the deaths of three other journalists to determine if they were work-related. Scores more have faced shelling, shooting, and detention as they work to provide vital information about the invasion. Russian journalists have been detained and threatened during Moscow’s crackdown on independent Russian media, and many have fled the country.
CPJ has called for the protection of Ukrainian journalists, along with the international reporters and media workers who join them in covering the conflict, and asked Ukraine to exempt them from compulsory military service. CPJ is tracking regional press freedom violations below and in its weekly Russia-Ukraine watch.
Deaths in Ukraine
Motive confirmed (12)
Motive unconfirmed (3)
CPJ safety advice
If you are a journalist covering Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, please consult the following safety advice:
- Physical Safety: War Reporting (Ukrainian | Russian)
- Physical Safety and Digital Safety: Civil Disorder (Ukrainian | Russian)
- Physical and Digital Safety: Arrest and Detention (Ukrainian | Russian)
- Digital Safety: Internet Shutdowns (Ukrainian | Russian)
- Risk assessment form (Ukrainian | Russian)
- Digital safety kit (Ukrainian | Russian)
If you are a journalist in need of emergency assistance, please contact [email protected].
CPJ news coverage
- Russian journalist Andrei Alekseyev injured by shrapnel in Donetsk
- Ukrainian journalists Sevgil Musaieva and Sonia Lukashova receive death threats
- Russian authorities fine Vecherniye Vedomosti newspaper, threaten 60.ru news website over Ukraine war coverage
- Two Reuters journalists injured, driver killed in Ukraine
- Ukrainian journalist Mykola Pastukh seriously injured by shelling in eastern Ukraine
- French journalist Frédéric Leclerc-Imhoff killed in Ukraine
- Two exiled Russian journalists charged for disseminating ‘fake’ news on war in Ukraine
- Ukrainian photojournalist Ihor Hudenko died in February
- Belarusian journalist detained for 2 months, charged over reporting
- Proposed Russian legislation threatens to shut down all independent media
Features and analysis
- Frontline diary: A day in the life of a Ukraine war correspondent
- ‘Disastrous for press freedom’: What Russia’s goal of an isolated internet means for journalists
- As Russia’s war in Ukraine drags on, Ukrainian journalists get help from Polish colleagues
- Some Ukrainian journalists are leaving the media for the military in the name of patriotism
- Emily Bell: Tech companies must ‘wake up’ to their role in Ukraine war disinformation
- ‘We expect anything’: A Russian union leader vows to keep helping journalists facing state repression
- Opinion: Putin tolerated some critical voices in his 22-year assault on Russian media. His war in Ukraine ends even that.
- Calling the war ‘war’: Meduza’s Galina Timchenko bucks Russia’s censorship on Ukraine
- ‘Hard, emotional and painful’: Journalists in Ukraine on covering Russia’s invasion
- Russia-Ukraine watch
Journalists killed for their work in Ukraine
More news and features of note
Reuters: U.S. targets Russia with tech to evade censorship of Ukraine news
BBC: Some of UK’s top journalists barred from Russia
Columbia Journalism Review: Three months of press threats in Ukraine
Neiman Reports: Ukraine’s information war is winning hearts and minds in the West
‘I almost got hit’: The Guardian reports on the Ukrainian journalists turned war correspondents overnight
TIME: Olga Rudenko and the Kyiv Independent are giving the world a window into a devastating war
The Guardian: Pulitzer prize for Ukraine journalists rewards courageous, truthful reporting
New York Times Opinion: The information war in Ukraine is far from over