The recent death of a Russian war correspondent caused an uproar, and his attack has also brought attention back to these special workers who are shuttling through the artillery fire and are not afraid of life and death!
According to Russian media reports, a few days ago, a war correspondent from the Russian newspaper "Izvestia" Semyon Eremin was targeted by a Ukrainian drone on his way back to southeastern Ukraine from the front line of Russian troops in the Zaporozhye region, and he himself finally died of his injuries.
Izvestia also published an obituary immediately after Eremin's death: "Our war correspondent Elemon was killed on Friday in a Ukrainian FPV drone attack in the Zaporizhzhia region, where he was filming a report".
In response to the death of the war correspondent, Mitry Peskov, secretary of the press office of the Russian president, said: The death of the correspondent of "Izvestia" is a huge tragedy, which also shows from another side how dangerous the work of a war correspondent is, he is our "hero", and it can be seen from this incident that the Ukrainian armed forces are deliberately targeting Russian war correspondents...
Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova said: Moscow believes that the cold-blooded murder of Eremin once again confirms the essence of the "terrorism" of the Kyiv regime, and Zelensky is vigorously pursuing those Russian journalists, military officers and public figures who convey the truth of the battlefield to the international community, and we call on relevant international organizations and human rights institutions to decisively condemn and punish them.
Zakharova also said: Those Russian journalists on the front line have become the top priority targets of the Ukrainian army, and the selective silence of the West allows the Kyiv group to launch any attack on journalists with impunity, so Western countries are also accomplices in this crime.
Not only did the Russian side make a high-profile statement about the killing of the journalist, but even the United Nations also made a statement on the matter, and UN spokesman Farhan Haq said after the incident: We oppose any killing of journalists, and all parties must fully investigate the Elemin incident.
It is not certain whether Ukraine carried out a targeted sniping of this journalist, and the Ukrainian side has not made any response, but one thing is certain, on the battlefield, these reporters engaged in news reporting will uniformly wear blue bulletproof vests that represent the identity of "journalists", and the word "PRESS" will be printed on them, if you look at it from the perspective of drones, this unique dress should be very easy to distinguish...
But there are also some more experienced war correspondents who tell afterwards: if you want to live longer on the battlefield, then don't wear this blue vest, it will make you an extremely visible target, and the Ukrainians don't care about your identity.
So whether Elemin is wearing this blue vest or not, the Russian media has not specifically mentioned it now.
We still have no way of knowing whether Ukraine has targeted these war correspondents, but these war correspondents who shuttle through the front line and are in danger of their lives at any time are indeed worthy of respect!
Let's take a look at who this fallen war correspondent is!
Semyon Elemin, 42, joined Izvestia in 2017 and was involved in the Caucasus anti-terrorist operation and the Russian army's operations in Syria before the invasion of Ukraine, and since 2014 he was one of the first journalists to enter the front line of Russia and Ukraine.
In 2022, the journalist and several other colleagues were attacked indiscriminately by Ukrainian drones, who were wearing blue vests that represented their identities, but when the drones spotted these conspicuous targets, they launched a frenzied attack on them.
A recent film about the liberation of Avdiivka released in Russia is also said to have received a lot of advice from the journalist during the filming;
Recently, the journalist has been working on the Russian "Lancet" drones and "Krasnopol" precision-guided artillery shells hitting targets, and he has also been vigorously promoting various anti-drone methods, such as suggesting that the Russian army use shotguns against Ukrainian drones, which may be one of the reasons why the journalist attracted Ukrainian sniping (speculation).
For his outstanding performance in the Russia-Ukraine conflict, Eremin was awarded the medal of "Meritorious Service to the Fatherland of the Second Degree" by Russia.
Semyon Eremin's death is the fourth journalist Russia has lost on the battlefield since the start of the war, so let's take a look at how many journalists/war correspondents have lost their lives in this conflict, which has lasted for more than two years?
According to current statistics, a total of 13 people have been killed in this conflict since 2022, including 4 Russians, 6 Ukrainians, 2 French, 1 American;
If you start counting from the war in Donbass in 2014, you have to add 7 people to this number, including 5 Russians, 1 Ukrainian and 1 Italian.
All in all, Russia has lost 11 journalists and related staff in the past 10 years, 7 in Ukraine, and the rest in other countries.
Here is the first journalist to be killed in the 2022 Russia-Ukraine conflict, his name is Yevni Sakun, and his death was actually quite unexpected, because he was working inside the Kyiv TV tower at the time, and Russian shelling hit the building, which eventually led to his death.
The vast majority of other journalists have been killed by artillery and rockets, after all, no one can escape these things, regardless of your identity.
But Eremin was the first war correspondent to be shot dead by an FPV drone in more than two years, which is fundamentally different from being killed in shelling, which is why Russia has reacted so much.
Of course, Western countries did not report on this matter, and as the spokesman of the Russian Foreign Ministry said, they chose to turn a blind eye to it.
Annotation:
Article 79 of the Geneva Conventions specifically regulates the rights and interests of war correspondents on the front lines:
Journalists in a war zone must be treated as civilians and protected accordingly as long as they are not involved in hostilities.