Ukraine: Writer and PEN Ukraine member Victoria Amelina seriously injured in Russian missile strike in Kramatorsk

29 June – PEN International joins PEN Ukraine in condemning the horrific Russian missile strike in Kramatorsk, Eastern Ukraine on 27 June 2023. Twelve people had been killed and more than 60 wounded at the time of writing, including writer, PEN Ukraine member and human rights defender Victoria Amelina, who remains in hospital.

Amelina was in Kramatorsk with Colombian writer Héctor Abad Faciolince, journalist Catalina Gómez Ángel and politician Sergio Jaramillo at the time of the attack. The Colombian delegates sustained minor injuries.

In a statement published on 29 June 2023, PEN Ukraine said: Our colleague Victoria Amelina, writer, member of PEN Ukraine, field investigator of Russian war crimes with Truth Hounds, was injured as a result of the Russian army’s missile shelling of a restaurant in Kramatorsk (Donetsk region) where she had been accompanying a delegation of Colombian journalists and writers. Now Victoria is in hospital. She is treated by experienced doctors, supported by her family and friends, and well stocked with all the essentials. There is no need for raising extra money. Further updates will be given by PEN Ukraine with the permission from Victoria’s family.

Romana Cacchioli, Executive Director of PEN International, said: Our thoughts and prayers are with Victoria Amelina, her family and loved ones, and everyone at PEN Ukraine during these truly horrific times. Victoria said that there are wounds only stories can heal. Today, we need her voice, her writings, more than ever, and hope for her prompt recovery. The Russian missile strike in Kramatorsk is yet another example of the Russian forces’ utter disregard for civilian lives in Ukraine. Deliberate attacks on civilian infrastructure amount to war crimes. All those responsible must be brought to justice.

Born in 1986, Victoria Amelina is a prize-winning writer and poet, and founder of the New York Literature Festival in the Donetsk region, Eastern Ukraine. Since the Russian Federation’s full-scale military invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022, Amelina has been documenting war crimes committed by Russian forces and notably uncovered the war diary of Ukrainian writer Volodymyr Vakulenko, who was abducted by Russian forces on 24 March 2022. On 28 November 2022, after the Ukrainian army recaptured Izium from Russian forces, DNA analysis confirmed that the body found in grave N.319 in the woods of Izium was that of Vakulenko. Amelina had recently taken part in the first presentation of his war diary at the Book Arsenal literary festival in Kyiv on 23 June 2023.

PEN International has repeatedly called on the Russian Federation to immediately and unconditionally end its devastating war against Ukraine, including through a Resolution adopted at PEN International’s 88th annual Congress in September 2022, a statement marking a year of war crimes and resolve in Ukraine, and a Declaration of PEN International’s Writers for Peace Committee issued in May 2023.  

For further details contact Aurélia Dondo, Head of Europe and Central Asia Region at PEN International: Aurelia.dondo@pen-international.org