A delegation from the French Ministry for the Armed Forces and Veterans Affairs, led by Minister Delegate Alice Rufo and French Ambassador to Ukraine Brice Roquefeuil, visited Suspilne Ukraine in Kyiv. During the visit on 11 September, the delegation saw the work of Suspilne’s news team at the News House and in the shelter, as well as a working session of the team developing an upcoming joint fiction project by Suspilne Ukraine and ARTE France.

The Suspilne team presented the French delegation with the broadcaster’s key areas of work, from news and regional broadcasting to archive preservation. Leading French institutions, including INA, the National Library of France and ECPAD, are contributing their expertise to Suspilne Mediateka, Suspilne’s open platform for archival video and audio.

“In France, we also have wartime documents and archives, and even decades after the war ended, they remain extremely important to society. They help us maintain a connection with the truth and understand our history. That is why it is so important to preserve the truth in historical memory and in the national narrative. What you are doing now is long-term work aimed at preserving this memory. And we need to support you in this over the long term,” said Alice Rufo.

Mykola Chernotytskyi, Head of the Managing Board of Suspilne Ukraine, thanked the partners for supporting Suspilne’s important work:

“We are glad to share our experience and the solutions that help us remain resilient as an institution during the war. We also discussed Suspilne’s work to preserve its archives. We are digitising our heritage, preserving one of the largest collections of television archives in Ukraine and building an archive of the present day. Our goal is to make these materials accessible to people through the Suspilne Mediateka website. This is why French expertise and the opportunity to learn from best practices in archive management are so valuable to us. We thank the people of France and our French partners for their consistent support for Suspilne, independent journalism and freedom of speech in Ukraine,” said Mykola Chernotytskyi.

French Ambassador to Ukraine Brice Roquefeuil outlined how the partnership with Suspilne Ukraine is developing through specific institutions and projects:

“France has developed substantial cooperation with Suspilne Ukraine. With the support of the French Ministry for Europe and Foreign Affairs, a number of projects are being implemented in three main areas: support for journalism with the participation of Canal France International; work with audiovisual archives in cooperation with Expertise France, the Institut national de l’audiovisuel (INA), ECPAD and the École des Chartes; and audiovisual production together with ARTE, including the ‘Génération Ukraine’ project comprising 12 documentaries, co-productions, and a 40-episode series project developed by film director Jacques Audiard to be filmed in Ukraine, with Ukrainian filmmakers and about Ukraine.”

“We greatly value our joint projects and the support of our French partners. It is encouraging to see this cooperation continue to expand and create new opportunities for Suspilne Ukraine to access expertise, develop new formats and bring Ukrainian content to a wider European audience,” said Andrii Taranov, Member of the Managing Board of Suspilne Ukraine responsible for marketing, research and international relations.

A working session of the team behind Suspilne and ARTE France’s joint fiction project about contemporary Kyiv was also taking place at Suspilne’s Kyiv office. The French delegation had an opportunity to observe part of the creative process.