The Kyiv Post’s Lee Reaney is in Beijing to cover all the action from the XXIV Winter Olympic Games, right up to the closing ceremony. He is the only English-language correspondent from Ukraine at the Olympics. Here he shares his thoughts on covering sports while Ukraine is at risk of a full-scale Russian invasion.
In a radio interview last week, I was asked, “What’s it like being a journalist in Ukraine right now”? I answered that I feel like I’m in the centre of the world.
From the Revolution of Dignity, illegal occupation of Crimea, and downings of MH17 and PS752 to the Russia-backed war in Eastern Ukraine, the Trump impeachment saga, and now the Russian armed forces build-up along the Ukrainian border – it seems Ukraine is never too far away from dominating the international news cycle.
But – believe it or not, folks – politics, war, and conflict are not only things that happen in Ukraine. These things don’t define Ukraine. Life goes on. People go shopping, watch movies, attend concerts, hold art and fashion shows, go to church or school, and enjoy coffees or spirits on terraces throughout the land.
Ukrainians also play sport – and there is no bigger moment in an athlete’s life than their opportunity at the Olympic Games.
The Ukrainian anthem was first heard at the Olympic Games in 1994 when 16-year-old Oksana Baiul won a competitive figure skating competition over Nancy Kerrigan and Tonya Harding.
An Olympic triumph can change the course of an athlete’s life. Success can bring lucrative sponsorships, one-of-a-kind job opportunities, and can bring the nation together with lasting memories that linger years beyond their time.
Which is why I’m in Beijing to cover the 2022 Olympic Games.
But how do I focus on sports with such a crisis brewing back in Ukraine?
It’s a good question – and you’re not the first to ask.
The EuroMaidan Olympics
Before I answer that question, let me first set the stage.
When I became Editor of Lviv Today in early 2013, the city was basking in the glow of its successful hosting of EURO 2012.
The city had big plans. Lviv had already been named a host city for EuroBasket 2014, but the local government had bigger dreams – Lviv wanted to host the 2022 Winter Olympic Games.
With the 2018 Olympics (South Korea) and the 2020 Olympics (Japan) both going to Asia, there was a belief that the 2022 Winter Games might be awarded to a European nation. As Editor of the city’s only English-language magazine, I arranged to cover the 2014 Olympic Games in Sochi, Russia.
Getting accreditation for mega-sporting events like the Olympics isn’t easy. It’s a multi-stage process that can take years. With plenty of coverage of Lviv’s 2022 bid, we made plans to head to Russia on a fact-finding mission.
Ukraine’s Oleksandr Abramenko competes to win the men’s aerials final during the Pyeongchang 2018 Winter Olympic Games at the Phoenix Park in Pyeongchang on February 18, 2018. / AFP PHOTO / LOIC VENANCE
Then the Revolution of Dignity happened
Things had already taken a turn for the deadly before we headed to Russia’s Black Sea resort. Several protesters had been killed, the leader of the ‘Auto Maidan’ had been captured and allegedly tortured, and Kyiv was not exactly a safe place to be.
“How can you be going to Russia to watch sports”, several Ukrainian friends and colleagues asked me, “when Ukrainians are laying their lives on the line for their freedom?”
It’s a fair question – and one I took seriously.
I spoke with other Ukrainian sports journalists and members of Ukraine’s National Olympic Committee to see what they had planned and their thoughts about traveling to cover sports during a time of crisis. Their sentiments were clear:
“These athletes have been training their whole lives for these moments, and they don’t come around very often”, colleagues told me. “And it’s important to remind people exactly what they are fighting for”.
We were abroad when the Revolution of Dignity reached crescendo with the deaths of 100 protestors and the fleeing of a disgraced Ukrainian President.
Do you remember what else happened that next day?
Ukraine’s women’s biathlon team powered past the favoured Russian home side to give the country its most emotional Olympic victory ever.
“Great proof of how sport can unite the nation”, Ukrainian NOC President Serhiy Bubka told me after the inspiring win – and after the medalists had take a minute of silence to honour the victims.
It’s these moments that define the role of a sports journalist. To share with a weeping nation a triumph in the face of tragedy.
The COVID Olympics
It’s been a whirlwind journey for me since those Olympics.
The Russian invasion of Crimea and support for insurgencies in Eastern Ukraine meant Ukraine had to give up its right to host EuroBasket – and Lviv had to give up its Olympic ambitions.
But the country soldiered on. And so, too, did our coverage of Ukraine’s finest athletes.
Lviv Today was named runner-up for 2017 Best Sports Journal by the National Olympic Committee of Ukraine and I was rewarded by becoming the first foreigner to win Olympic accreditation by Ukraine’s NOC.
I also became a leading Para sports journalist, covering inspiring stories from athletes around the world for a variety of international organisations, sports federations, and national federations.
At almost 37, Ukraine’s Ihor Reizlin waited until late to make his first Olympic Games – and he made it count by capturing bronze in epee fencing.
When COVID hit in 2020 and caused the postponement of the 2020 Olympic and Paralympic Games, I quickly reached out to athletes and covered their stories of how they adapted to training at home in a popular social media series for World Taekwondo.
I followed athletes as they were forced to adapt to another year of training – often in less-than-ideal circumstances – as they sought to adapt to the once-in-a-lifetime postponement
Tokyo’s ‘Pandemic Olympics’ had an abundance of stories – from how athletes adapted their trainings, to athletes being forced to withdraw due to contracting the disease, to the COVID countermeasures the Japanese government decided to take.
But as always, it was the athletes stories that shone through.
From the high of watching wrestler Zhan Beleniuk turn his 2016 Olympic silver into a 2020 Olympic gold, to the low of seeing boxer Oleksandr Khyzhniak turn a sure-fire gold into a gut-wrenching silver, it was the athletes themselves that took centre stage.
My favorite story from Tokyo 2020 was that of fencer Ihor Reizlin. Competing at his first Olympic Games at almost 37 years old, Reizlin wasn’t even sure he’d continue to compete when the Tokyo 2020 postponement was first announced. He decided to stick with it, trained as best he could, and was rewarded with a memorable bronze in what was likely his one-and-only Olympic Games.
The Will-Russia-Invade Olympics
The crises just keep coming in Ukraine.
Not only do Ukrainian athletes have to deal with record numbers of COVID cases back home and a heavy-handed approach to COVID countermeasures by the Chinese government, but they also worry about the safety of their loved ones due to an unprecedented threat of invasion by the Russian military.
Unlike ancient times, when ceasefires were followed during the Olympic Games, Russia sees the world as distracted. Besides the invasion of Crimea shortly after hosting the 2014 Olympics, Russia invaded Georgia the same day Beijing last opened the Olympic Games in 2008.
Which is what has Ukrainians worried about another Olympic invasion.
The threat of invasion is so real that Ukrainian Youth & Sports Minister Vadym Hutzeit assured press that the government has contingency plans should Russia decide to make a move while Ukrainian athletes are in Beijing.
The Minister held a briefing with athletes traveling to Beijing to speak about how to deal with Russian media, what to do if they must share a podium with a Russian athlete, and what contingency plans the government has in case of a full-scale invasion.
We sports journalists, too, had to seek our marching orders from our ‘higher-ups’ to determine what kind of response is warranted should such an escalation take place.
How political should one’s questions be to athletes competing at an event that implores peace from participating nations? They aren’t the ones making political decisions. They aren’t the ones making military decisions. They just want to play sports.
Then again, ignoring the situation isn’t an option. Pretending like nothing is happening is to be so wilfully ignorant that one risks all credibility as a journalist – sports or not.
So, where is the balance? How do you determine your approach?
For me, there are three factors:
1. If possible, keep the focus on the athletes. Ask about how the situation is affecting their families. What did they tell them before they left for China? What are their interactions like with Russian athletes? If you keep sports journalism about sports, you’re always safe.
2. Confer with your colleagues. Who knows better than Ukrainian sports journalists that have covered sports during crises from the past? In Beijing, we have journalists that have covered Ukrainian sport during the fall of the USSR, the Orange Revolution, the Revolution of Dignity, the invasion of Crimea, the war in Eastern Ukraine, and the global COVID pandemic. We have responses ready.
3. Don’t embarrass yourself, your company, or the country. Ukrainian sports journalists walk around wearing the same uniforms as our athletes – we are literally branded as Ukraine. Many of us wear logos of our companies on outerwear or recording equipment. Any overly unfriendly, unreasonable, or aggressive behaviour could easily make its way into some kind of disinformation or propaganda campaign, so interact with others as though the world is watching – they very well just might be.
From Oksana Baiul’s mesmerising figure skating gold medal in 1994, to the women’s biathlon team’s emotional gold in 2014, to Oleksandr Abramenko’s death-defying championship run at PyeongChang 2018, Ukraine’s winter Olympians have created some of the most memorable sporting moments in modern Ukrainian history.
And The Kyiv Post will be there for the next time they do – and to cover all the reaction should the situation deteriorate back home.
It’s just too bad that the 2022 Olympics aren’t taking place in Lviv – in part, because of a previous Russian invasion of Ukraine.
