The Reckoning Project
The Reckoning Project: Ukraine Testifies is an initiative of Ukrainian and international
reporters, analysts and lawyers aimed at eradicating impunity and bringing justice.
Our on-the-ground investigative journalists work together with lawyers to create multimedia content to ensure the war is not forgotten, even as it recedes from the headlines. At the same time, we collect testimonies and evidence that will have legal force in war crimes cases.
Team
Our team is an assembly of experienced and award-winning multimedia journalists, documentary filmmakers, academics, lawyers, and war crimes researchers who have worked in Syria, Chechnya, Rwanda, and Bosnia, and now joined the efforts to capture the historical truth of Russia's war against Ukraine.
From our painful experience, we have learned that justice can easily be lost, with devastating consequences for sustaining peace and accurate historical memory. Misinformation and authoritarian rule often prevail. Our mission is to ensure this never happens again.
Testimonies
Our team has learned firsthand that in too many horrifying conflicts, national and international courts have dismissed testimonies collected by journalists due to discrepancies between legal and journalistic modes of investigation.
The Reckoning Project is closing this gap by training journalists and researchers to swiftly record, collect, and conserve witness statements on alleged war crimes according to the methodology that makes them applicable for litigation so the voices of survivors are heard in the courts of law.
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More than 350 witnesses testified
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Most of the testimonies have been submitted to the Prosecutor General's Office of Ukraine
Universal Jurisdiction
On April 15, the initiative of Ukrainian and international journalists and lawyers documenting war crimes, The Reckoning Project (TRP), along with a Ukrainian citizen who was present in Buenos Aires, filed a criminal lawsuit with the Federal Court of Argentina. The case concerns the torture of a Ukrainian civilian by Russians in one of the cities they occupied.
Documentary film “The Last Family”
When a Russian bomb destroyed a nursing home in Sumy, Lidiya and Volodymyr — together for 67 years — were separated: she was evacuated to Kyiv, and he to the Sumy region. She has dementia and cannot move, he has lost his sight, yet he still dreams of their reunion. Another couple — the “old newlyweds” Oleksandr and Lyudmyla — met in a care home, and their wedding was interrupted by an airstrike. The war has divided the lives of people living near the border, but the heroes of the film say they find the strength to go on in love.
Special Projects
Beyond the scope of using testimonies to secure justice, we create large media projects for renowned Ukrainian and international outlets. Our writers and documentary filmmakers continue working to keep the court of public opinion engaged and ensure that stories of war crime survivors are in the consistent spotlight of global discussions, expediting justice for them.
Authors: Ghanna Mamonova, Anna Tsygyma
How Russia Destroys Care Homes for the Elderly
A Russian air bomb hit a nursing home in Sumy, separating a couple who had been together for 67 years and ruining the wedding of another pair who had just begun their life together. How do they find the strength to rebuild their lives under such circumstances?
Authors: Viktoria Balytska, Kostiantyn Korobov
The Story of Olena and the Ukrainians Living in Territories Occupied by Russia — Those Whom Some Would “Trade for Peace”
For more than two and a half years, the resort town of Kyrylivka on the Azov coast has been under Russian occupation. Formally, Russian laws and regulations are in effect there — tools the occupying authorities use to intimidate and oppress the local population.
Authors: Ghanna Mamonova, Anna Tsygyma
How Sumy Is Recovering After the Largest Russian Missile Strike on the City
On April 15, Ghanna Mamonova and Anna Tsygyma visited Sumy to speak with eyewitnesses of the attack and document how the city is recovering from the most powerful missile strike since the beginning of Russia’s full-scale invasion.
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Author: Ghanna Mamonova
“It Was Treacherous. They Fired Twice.” A Report from Sumy, Where Residents Are Recovering After the Largest Russian Missile Strike on the City
Ghanna Mamonova went to Sumy after the deadliest attack on the city since the beginning of Russia’s full-scale invasion — to see and hear what was left behind. Her report captures the voices of those who survived.
Author: Ghanna Mamonova
Russians Bombed a Nursing Home in Sumy. The Elderly Were Separated and Evacuated — Only Memories, Paintings, and a Little Romance Remain
A guided air bomb struck the care home on September 19, around 3:30 p.m. The staff were getting ready to go home, and the residents were resting. The air raid alert had been announced a few hours earlier — but by then, everyone had already forgotten about it.
The Reckoning Project, Legal Team
Propaganda, Impunity, Destruction, and Recurrence: How Russia Violates International Law in Chechnya, Syria, and Ukraine
A report by The Reckoning Project for the UN Special Rapporteur on the Promotion of Truth, Justice, Reparation, and Guarantees of Non-Recurrence concerning the actions of the Russian Federation.
Author: Svitlana Oslavska
One Day in the Life of a Ukrainian Prosecutor Investigating Russia’s War Crimes
The Reckoning Project documents and preserves eyewitness testimonies of Russia’s war crimes in Ukraine. Investigating these crimes amid an ongoing war means working under fire — Ukrainian prosecutors often risk their lives and sometimes become victims of Russian aggression themselves.
Authors: Angelina Kariakina, Ghanna Mamonova
Doctors in Kyiv Shielded Children on Operating Tables from Fragments of a Russian Missile
On July 8, Russia launched 38 missiles of various types across Ukraine, according to Mykola Oleshchuk, Commander of the Ukrainian Air Force. Due to the complexity and scale of the attack, not all of them could be intercepted.
Author: Ghanna Mamonova
“The Disaster Came at Dawn. I Had Only a Few Hours,” — Says a Ukrainian Man About the Destruction of a Giant Dam
A year ago, a series of powerful explosions destroyed the Kakhovka Hydroelectric Power Plant in southern Ukraine — one of the largest in Europe. Within eight hours, the water flooded more than eighty settlements on both banks of the Dnipro River, trapping over a hundred thousand people. The water level rose by ten meters. The Czech outlet Aktuálně.cz publishes an in-depth report by a Ukrainian journalist on the aftermath of this tragedy.
Author: Halyna Tereshchuk
“Big Water” Environmental Inspectors Document Evidence of Ecocide After the Destruction of the Kakhovka Dam
The film “Big Water” tells the story of the employees of the Kherson Regional Environmental Service, who collect evidence every day proving Russia’s crimes on Ukrainian territory. Together with the Office of the Prosecutor General, they are working to establish that the destruction of the Kakhovka Reservoir dam constitutes an act of ecocide committed by Russia in Ukraine.
Author: Nataliya Gumenyuk
“They Can Feel Our Pain.” Natalia Gumenyuk on Taking a Case Against Russians to Argentina
On April 16, The Reckoning Project filed the first criminal lawsuit alleging torture on Russian-occupied Ukrainian territory — in a federal court in Argentina. The plaintiff, whose identity is withheld for security reasons, filed the case in Buenos Aires with the support of the project’s lawyers and journalists. This is a conversation about the specifics of the lawsuit and the challenges faced by Ukrainian journalists during wartime.
Author: Nataliya Gumenyuk
Nataliya Gumenyuk, a Ukrainian Who Came to Mendoza to Tell the World About the Horrors of War
Together with reporters, witnesses, and lawyers, Gumenyuk founded The Reckoning Project — an initiative dedicated to collecting testimonies about human rights violations in the war between Ukraine and Russia and submitting them to courts around the world. In April, she filed a human rights lawsuit in an Argentine court. In an exclusive interview with Diario UNO, she spoke about the daily lives of Ukrainians in the conflict zone, the suffering of those held in captivity — enduring hunger, torture, electric shocks, and burns — and shared her perspective on the war.
Author: Olena Bohdanok
Torture in the Occupied Territories of Ukraine: The Reckoning Project Files a Lawsuit in Argentina
On April 15, the Ukrainian and international initiative of journalists and lawyers documenting war crimes — The Reckoning Project — together with a Ukrainian citizen who was present in Buenos Aires as a victim, filed a criminal lawsuit in Argentina’s Federal Court. This is the first Ukrainian case in history concerning torture by Russian occupiers to be filed in an Argentine court.
Author: Oksana Kovalenko
A Lawsuit Was Filed in Argentina Against Russians Who Tortured a Ukrainian. Why There?
On April 15, 2024, the non-governmental organization The Reckoning Project filed a lawsuit in an Argentine court on behalf of a Ukrainian man tortured by Russian soldiers in the occupied territories. This is the first Ukrainian case of torture to be filed specifically in Argentina. The victim’s name and even the location where the crime was committed are not disclosed. Lawyers are asking the court to investigate the torture as a war crime and a crime against humanity.
Authors: Adam Jourdan and Stephanie van den Berg
Ukrainian Files Torture Complaint Against Russians — Case to Be Heard in Argentina
A Ukrainian man who says he was tortured by Russian occupying forces has filed a legal complaint halfway around the world — in Argentina. It’s an unusual move in an effort to seek accountability for alleged war crimes at a time when Ukrainian prosecutors are overwhelmed with cases.
Author: Svitlana Oslavska
JOURNEY INTO HORROR: A DAY WITH A PROSECUTOR INVESTIGATING RUSSIA'S WAR CRIMES IN UKRAINE
Viktoriia Shapovalova is in charge of investigating the crimes of the Russian army in Mykolaiv. The challenge of breaking the silence of the survivors and determining the identity of the kidnappers and torturers.
Author: Kristina Berdynskykh
STORIES OF CAPTIVITY AND RESISTANCE IN KREMLIN-OCCUPIED UKRAINE
The Russians turned a Nova Kakhovka police precinct into a place where they held, beat
up, and tortured civilians.The article was also published by our media partners OKO.press (Polish), zdg (Romanian), Aktuálně.cz (Czech)
Author: Svitlana Oslavska
Film: Nataliya Gumenyuk, Angelina Kariakina, Lyuba Knorozok, Yuriy Dunay, Peter Pomerantsev, Andriy Bashtovyi, Andriy Lysetskyi, Anna Tsyhyma
INSIDE THE BASEMENT WHERE AN ENTIRE UKRAINIAN VILLAGE SPENT A HARROWING MONTH IN CAPTIVITY
When Russians occupied Yahidne village in Chernihiv Oblast, its residents, including dozens of children and elderly people, were forced into a school basement for nearly a month.
Author: Nataliya Gumenyuk
Film: Anna Tsyhyma
HOW ONE BESIEGED HOSPITAL IN UKRAINE TREATED WOUNDED CITIZENS, SOLDIERS, AND INVADING RUSSIAN TROOPS
The village of Snihurivka was on the front line between Mykolaiv and the occupied Kherson. Medics of the large district hospital provided assistance to the wounded and were not yet realizing that over the next nine months they would be forced to coexist with the occupiers.
Authors: Nataliya Gumenyuk, Olena Nizhelska
Film: Anna Tsyhyma
AN INSIDE VIEW OF A DEADLY ATTACK ON A UKRAINIAN RAIL STATION
The Russian missile strike on the railway station in Kramatorsk remains one of the bloodiest attacks against Ukrainian civilians since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion.
Author: Angelina Kariakina
THREE STORIES OF PREGNANCY AND BIRTH IN UKRAINE
“I was to be a pregnant woman in a country where it seemed a pregnant woman had become a target”. While investigating the Russian attack on the maternity hospital in Mariupol, the author discovers that she herself is expecting a child.
Authors: Anne Applebaum, Nataliya Gumenyuk
Film: Roman Bondarchuk
‘THEY DIDN’T UNDERSTAND ANYTHING, BUT JUST SPOILED PEOPLE’S LIVES’. HOW RUSSIAN INVADERS UNLEASHED VIOLENCE ON SMALL-TOWN RESIDENTS
In the occupied territories, Russia systematically persecutes Ukrainians active in their communities, heads of villages and towns, and local volunteers.
Author: Iryna Lopatina
Film: Nataliya Gumenyuk, Angelina Kariakina, Lyuba Knorozok
‘DAD, YOU HAVE TO COME—OR WE WILL BE ADOPTED’: ONE UKRAINIAN FAMILY’S HARROWING WARTIME SAGA
Three children survived the siege of Mariupol, forced relocation, their father’s horrific detainment, and their own exile—to Russia.
Author: Vira Kuryko-Ahiienko
Film: Oksana Karpovych, Angelina Kariakina, Vadym Ilkov, Lyuba Knorozok
ONE DAY UNDER PUTIN’S UNGUIDED BOMBS
On March 3, 2022, a series of Russian aerial attacks on Chernihiv, a northeastern Ukrainian city near the Russia and Belarus borders, marked one of the first massive airstrikes since the start of the Kremlin’s full-scale war against Ukraine.
Author: Janine di Giovanni
VLADIMIR PUTIN’S INHUMANE BLUEPRINT TO TERRORIZE CIVILIANS IN CHECHNYA, SYRIA—AND NOW UKRAINE
Vladimir Putin became the prime minister of Russia in August 1999, then president in March 2000. And in the 24 years since, the list of wars conducted on his watch amounts to a catalog of human misery. That roster of calamity has culminated, of course, in the war that has mobilized Europe against Putin’s war machine—the devastating invasion of Ukraine.
Author: Gulliver Cragg
RUSSIAN WAR CRIMES IN UKRAINE: THE QUEST FOR JUSTICE
Authors: Daria Yanushkevych, Denys Shaposhnikov
‘IF ONLY WE HAD KNOWN’: HALF A YEAR AFTER THE ROCKET ATTACK ON CHERNIHIV, THE TORII FAMILY SPOKE ABOUT THEIR LOSS
Returning from church on the feast of the Transfiguration of Jesus, the Torii family was hit by a rocket attack on the drama theatre in Chernihiv.
«The Scariest Days of My Life»
In 2023, we published a book featuring reports by journalists of The Reckoning Project, which became a historical document of the first year of the Russian full-scale war against Ukraine. The voices of witnesses and survivors had already shattered Russia's intention to conceal its atrocities once again. The texts in the book transformed tragic memories into evidence that can be used in legal proceedings.
