Presentation by Nataliya Gumenyuk, Lyuba Knorozok, and Raji Abdul Salam, accompanied with a screening of the film CHORNOBYL 22 (21 mins.) by Oleksiy Radynski

In English with simultaneous translation into German

During Russia’s occupation of the Chornobyl Zone in early 2022, a local informant is clandestinely filming the Russian troops. We hear the workers of the Chornobyl nuclear power station discuss their experiences during the Russian military takeover of their facility—an act of nuclear terror which threatened another global disaster at this site. Past and present catastrophic scenarios intertwine in this episode of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

The Reckoning Project: Ukraine Testifies is an initiative launched by international and Ukrainian reporters, analysts, and researchers to document war crimes and create appealing stories which would become the historic documents of the Russian war in Ukraine. Ukraine-based journalists and researchers collect witness testimonies of alleged war crimes, recording them in a neutral way according to the requirements for use in court. The team and analysts then verify them, while Ukrainian writers and documentary filmmakers create multimedia content based on the testimonies, under the leadership of the renowned international and Ukrainian writers and reporters Janine di Giovani, Peter Pomerantsev, and the Public Interest Journalism Lab under the leadership of Nataliya Gumenyuk.

Nataliya Gumenyuk is a prominent Ukrainian journalist and author specializing in foreign affairs and conflict reporting. She is the founder and CEO of the Public Interest Journalism Lab and the author of several documentaries and books. Gumenyuk regularly writes for The Guardian, The Washington Post, Rolling Stone, Die Zeit, The Atlantic, and The New York Times. She also provides commentaries for CNN, MSNBC, Sky News, Monocle, and others. Gumenyuk was the co-founder and head of Independent Hromadske TV and Hromadske International and is currently on the station’s executivce board. She is a Member of the Council for Freedom of Speech Under the President of Ukraine, and of the Independent Media Council.

Raji Abdul Salam is a legal data archive analyst with experience in documenting war crimes, crimes against humanity, and attempted genocides in Syria and Iraq. His investigation of hundreds of testimonies contributed to holding Syrian war criminals and perpetrators of crimes against humanity accountable under universal jurisdiction in Germany, Sweden, and Belgium, and under limited universal jurisdiction in the Netherlands. Salam is an expert in investigating human rights violations, validating documented testimonies, and tracing the chain of custody of collected evidence. He has an extensive background in collecting, verifying, preserving, and performing multi-variable analyses sensitive to human rights violations, universal jurisdiction, and international litigation.