The VIII Regional Meeting of PEN Centers took place in Kyiv

On May 15-18, the VIII Regional Meeting of PEN Centers, organized by PEN Ukraine with support from PEN International and the New Democracy Fund, took place in Kyiv

Launched in 2014 as an annual meeting of PEN Centers from the Central and Eastern Europe, this event constitutes a safe venue for mutual support and a platform to discuss challenges for the freedom of speech and human rights in the region. Since the beginning of Russia’s full-scale war against Ukraine, the Meeting is subjected to expressing the international PEN community’s solidarity with Ukraine.

The pool of participants of the VII Regional meeting included Carles Torner (PEN Catalan), Khatuna Tskhadadze (PEN Georgia), Carole Mesrobian (PEN France), and Froukje Santing (PEN Netherlands).

During their visit to Ukraine, the participants met representatives of human rights and cultural organizations and visited the localities of Kyiv and Chernihiv regions where they saw firsthand the consequences of the Russian army’s aggression during the occupation in 2022.

The cultural activists also visited key sightseeing attractions of Kyiv – St. Sophia’s Cathedral, St. Michael’s Cathedral, and Maidan Nezalezhnosti. At the Khanenko Museum, they met the representatives of cultural institutions such as the Khanenko museum itself, Dovzhenko Centre, and the national Academy of Visual Arts. At the Ukrainian House national Centre, the delegates attended the exhibition Unseen Force, dedicated to Ukrainian’s non-violent struggle against occupation and its manifestations in art.

The representatives of PEN Centers had a possibility to meet the teams of Ukrainian human rights organizations – the Centre for Civil Liberties, Human Rights Centre ZMINA, and Truth Hounds. The team of the Truth Hounds NGO presented, particularly, the case of Ukrainian writer Volodymyr Vakulenko-K., his abduction and murder in the Russian-occupied Izium district.

Additionally, Carles Torner, Khatuna Tskhadadze, Carole Mesrobian and Froukje Santing met photojournalist Stas Kozliuk, writer Myroslav Laiuk and deputy general director of the Ukrainian Institute Alim Aliev. The meetings, aimed to discuss the role of authors in time of war, took place under the moderation of writer and radio presenter Olena Huseinova.

Within the Regional Meeting, the representatives of PEN Centers joined two public events at PEN Ukraine Space. They namely attended a conversation with British historian Timothy Garton Ash and took part in the discussion Europe: time to rewrite / time to re-read, moderated by Ostap Slyvynsky.

During these days, the participants of the Regional Meeting also accepted a resolution stressing that "Russian aggression is directed not only against Ukraine, but against the very idea of culture, with its intrinsic value of the capacity to create, and against the idea of civilization, with its intrinsic value of the capacity to live together".

Photo: Valentyna Naumenko