UNITED NATIONS (AP) — The US and Britain have invited ambassadors, journalists and representatives of a broad spectrum of society to a U.N. screening of the award-winning documentary “20 Days in Mariupol,” which follows a trio of Related Press journalists throughout Russia’s relentless siege of the Ukrainian port metropolis within the early days of the warfare.
UK Ambassador Barbara Woodward mentioned the Monday night screening at U.N. headquarters is necessary as a result of “Russia’s invasion of Ukraine threatens what the U.N. stands for: a world order the place the sovereignty and territorial integrity of all nations is prime.”
The screening comes initially of the 78th session of the U.N. Basic Meeting and per week earlier than world leaders arrive for his or her annual assembly, the place the greater than 18-month war in Ukraine is anticipated to be within the highlight — particularly with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy scheduled to talk in particular person for the primary time.
The harrowing documentary, which was produced by the AP and the PBS series “Frontline,” is culled from 30 hours of footage AP journalist Mstyslav Chernov and his colleagues shot in Mariupol following Russia’s Feb. 24, 2022, invasion of Ukraine and its siege of town.
It paperwork combating within the streets, the crushing pressure on Mariupol’s residents, and assaults that killed pregnant girls, youngsters and others. The siege, which ended on Might 20, 2022, with the give up of a small group of outgunned and outmanned Ukrainian fighters on the Azovstal metal plant, left hundreds lifeless and town in ruins.
The U.S. ambassador to the U.N., Linda Thomas-Greenfield, mentioned “’20 Days in Mariupol’ is a residing doc of the horrors of (Russian President Vladimir) Putin’s warfare of aggression.”
“We should bear witness to those atrocities and reaffirm our dedication to justice and peace in Ukraine,” she mentioned.
The AP’s reporting from Mariupol drew the Kremlin’s ire, with its U.N. ambassador, Vasily Nebenzia, claiming throughout a Safety Council assembly within the siege’s early days that photographs exhibiting the aftermath of a missile strike on a maternity hospital have been staged.
AP Senior Vice President and Govt Editor Julie Tempo referred to as the documentary “a testomony to the facility and influence of eyewitness journalism,” stressing that with out it, “the world wouldn’t have identified the atrocities that passed off.”
“To have the movie screened on the United Nations because the U.N. Basic Meeting will get underway underscores the significance of fact-based journalism on a world scale,” she mentioned.
“20 Days in Mariupol” gained the Sundance International Viewers Award for Finest Documentary and a number of other different prizes. Director Chernov was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Public Service together with photographer Evgeniy Maloletka, producer Vasilisa Stepanenko and Paris-based correspondent Lori Hinnant for his or her “brave reporting” on Mariupol.
Raney Aronson-Rath, editor-in-chief and govt producer of “Frontline,” referred to as it “deeply significant” to have the chance to display screen the documentary on the United Nations. She mentioned the producers proceed to share the movie world wide to offer audiences the chance to “bear witness to the atrocities that Ukrainians have endured.”
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For extra AP protection of the warfare in Ukraine: