Ukrinform Turns 100

The first Ukrainian news agency, Ukrinform, turned 100 years old this week.

Hetman Pavlo Skoropadskyi initially founded the agency that now has a network of correspondents across the world.

One of its employees is 90-year-old Yuriy Illenko. Illenko is the oldest photojournalist at Ukrinform and he’s been there for 50 years.

Oddly enough, he hadn’t imagined that he would become a photojournalist. He’d studied law.

“He said, ‘You will never be a lawyer because a person who gets a taste of journalism will never go back,'” Illenko said, recounting some words he’d been told long ago. “And this is what happened. I worked as an investigator for a few years, but I didn’t get along with the region’s prosecutor and I left to work for the Ukrainian Radio-Telegraph Agency.”

That was what Ukrinform was known as until 1990. The agency was renamed ‘Ukrinform’ after Ukraine gained its independence. Its office is located in a historic building in the center of Kyiv.

“It used to be a hotel. Actors and poets lived here. This balcony was good for speeches. I think Mayakovsky spoke here because he lived in this room. It was a deluxe room. And some people say that it was here that he recited the poem ‘Comrade Moskal, don’t grin with jokes at Ukraine,’” editor and analyst Yevhen Yakunov said.

Now, a large banner featuring Roman Sushchenko’s image hangs from the same balcony. The Russian Federation illegally sentenced the Ukrinform correspondent to 12 years in prison on espionage charges. But Ukrainian officials say these are trumped up charges and have repeatedly called for his release.

“We worked together. We talked a lot. When he wrote large interviews, I approved all the topics,” Yakunov said.

After World War II, the agency’s archives were moved to Moscow and have yet to be returned to Kyiv. But there are a few 100-year-old reports that have been saved.

“The first publication was in 1918, about Hetman Skoropadsky, who took up his duties. He founded the first national news agency,” Yakunov said.

Ukrinform is one of the largest Ukrainian news agencies. In the nearest future, the management plans to open a bureau in the United States. Correspondent Heorhiy Tykhyi will work in New York.

“I’ve always wanted to work for Ukraine and for Ukrainian media. Especially for a national agency,” correspondent Tykhyi said.

Ukrinform has the largest photo archive in Ukraine. It features half a million photos which preserve the country’s history.