Anyone following the war in Ukraine cannot ignore Illia Ponomarenko. The 30-year-old military reporter for the Kyiv Independent is the most important English-speaking Ukrainian journalist with 1.2 million Twitter followers. Last night he was in Amsterdam for the annual October lecture of the knowledge platform Raam op Russia. He previously spoke to the NOS about his job.

His work changed drastically during the war. “You’re not just doing your job, you’re doing a service for your country,” he says, describing his work. Not as a spokesman for the state, but as the country’s “unofficial ambassador”. Before that he worked “95 percent of his time”. “My girlfriend doesn’t like it, but I’m constantly gathering information.”

Ponomarenko was visibly relieved to leave Ukraine after a 30-hour journey. “Here in Amsterdam you can breathe the air of a city that has not been poisoned by the fear of war.” War is always close in Kyiv: “I keep checking my smartwatch to see if an air raid alarm is sounding or if it’s time for a curfew. And a rocket could land at any moment. You can’t predict what’s going to happen.”

This uncertainty also makes his work as a journalist more difficult. “This war is full of surprises, not only negative ones, so I no longer dare to predict anything.”

Restrictions, no censorship

Ponomarenko’s Twitter timeline consists not only of news, but also of heroic reports about the Ukrainian armed forces. But he is also free to criticize the Ukrainian authorities, he assures. “I can write a critical Facebook post about an army officer without consequences.”

However, there are some limitations to frontline reporting. For example, there is media silence about the offensive announced by the authorities in Kherson. “It’s difficult for us, but necessary for the safety of the company. There is absolutely no censorship,” he says.

“Ukraine is not like Russia. Our military understands that at some point you have to share information. If you remain silent, the public will ask questions or have doubts. Besides, people will also find out for themselves if people are dying.” The journalist also talks to civilians and acquaintances from the army, in which Ponomarenko himself used to serve.

The casualty figures are shared only in general terms: around 50 to 60 injured and dead Ukrainian militants per day. “We will hear exact numbers after the war.” The exact size of Ukraine’s armed forces is also a mystery to Ponomarenko. “It was therefore a surprise for me that we had enough men for an offensive both in Kharkov and in Kherson,” he says, referring to the successful recapture of territory last month.

Turn off emotions

The 30-year-old has been working as a defense reporter since 2017, at a time when the conflict in eastern Ukraine was somewhat frozen. He grew up in the city of Volnovacha in the Donetsk region and studied in Mariupol. Both his hometown and college town were largely razed to the ground by Russian attacks that spring. “Volnovacha doesn’t exist anymore, you can’t live there anymore. And my contacts from Mariupol fled or were killed.”

The personal effects of the war did not affect his journalistic work, he says. To do this, he switches off the “destructive emotions”. “What use is a reader from Amsterdam, for example, if I report emotionally? The reader wants me to act rationally. It makes no sense if I tweet in all caps that I hate Russians.”

A major obstacle for Ponomarenko is that part of his international audience is unaware of the fact that Ukraine is a victim of this war. “It’s because of the message Russia is feeding them: it’s a war between two peoples, two neighboring countries, and it’s too complicated for an outsider, so better keep your distance.”

Ponomarenko is also the target of Russian disinformation campaigns, he says. He is often referred to as a Nazi. “Without evidence, but there’s always someone who believes.” The ongoing Nazi accusations led to a job for an American medium once being poked through his nose. “In the end, just to be safe, they broke the collaboration because of these bots screaming ‘Nazi’.

Ponomarenko is clear that his English-language reporting is crucial to keeping the world interested in Ukraine. He was also generally satisfied with foreign reporting on Ukraine. “Only sometimes I see messages like this shudder such as calls for Ukraine to cede territory or sit down with Putin. These people don’t understand what’s going on.”