Avenging Gongadze

Meeting on Tuesday October 28 2003, 6pm

Gongadze was the Ukrainian website editor whose gruesome murder has become a focus for the fight for press freedom in the country.

He disappeared in the capital, Kyiv, in September 2000. His headless body was later found in a ditch. There is strong evidence that the order to kill him came from the very highest level - from President Leonid Kuchma.

The case was featured in the latest issue of the Journalist, reporting the visit to London by Gongadze's widow Myroslava.

Next week a group of leading Ukrainian journalists' union representatives are visiting London and two of them are to speak at a special briefing organised by the NUJ on Tuesday October 28. They are

• VOLODYMYR MOSTOVYI, editor-in-chief of "Zerkalo Nedeli" (Mirror of the Week) weekly, the most highly regarded independent paper in Kyiv. He has won international awards.
• SERGEI HUZ, chair of the Kyiv Independent Media Trade Union, the new union being set up by independent journalists. He is a former editor of the newspaper Sobytie" (Event) in Dniprodzerzhyns'k.

These colleagues are avenging Gyorgy Gongadze's murder by fighting for independent media and a strong and independent journalists' union. They have the NUJ's support, and the union is inviting members to come and hear them speak.

The meeting is at the NUJ, 308 GRAYS INN ROAD, LONDON WC1 (KINGS CROSS TUBE) at 6pm.

More details from Tim Gopsill
0207 843 3701