Several personalities were present during this tribute, such as the Minister of Culture Rima Abdul Malak or the Ambassador of Ukraine Vadim Omelchenko
His colleagues praised his work and his bright personality. A tribute to journalist Arman Soldin, killed in early May in Ukraine at the age of 32, was organized at Agence France-Presse (AFP) on Thursday 1 June. Since the announcement of his death on May 9, “the emotion has not subsided. I even have the impression that over time, it increases, as we all become imbued with Arman’s extremely endearing, solar personality”said Fabrice Fries, CEO of AFP.
Arman Soldin, AFP’s video coordinator in Ukraine, was killed in a Russian rocket attack in the east of the country, near the town of Bakhmout, the epicenter of fighting for months. Before the tribute to the journalist, the director of information of the AFP, Phil Chetwynd, gave details of the circumstances of his death in an email to employees. Arman Soldin “was killed by Grad rocket fire near the village of Chassiv Iar, eastern Ukraine, as our team of four journalists was walking away from the front lines, escorted by two Ukrainian soldiers “. “The rocket landed very close to Arman and he died almost instantly,” while the soldier in front of him “managed to dive into a nearby trench” and his colleagues, a few meters away, were able to throw themselves to the ground.
He is at least the eleventh reporter, fixer or driver of journalists to have been killed in Ukraine since the beginning of the Russian invasion.
An ability to “find breaths of life” in “horror”
Several personalities were present during this tribute, such as the Minister of Culture Rima Abdul Malak, the Ukrainian Ambassador Vadim Omelchenko, media leaders such as Edwy Plenel (Mediapart) and Marie-Christine Saragosse (France Médias Monde), as well that the parents of Frédéric Leclerc-Imhoff, a BFMTV journalist also killed at 32 in Ukraine a year ago.
“In the field, Arman was always serious, focused and always aware of the risks like all of us. Yes, Arman was filming up close. Because we don’t film war from afar”greeted his AFP colleague Emmanuel Peuchot, who was a few meters from him when he died. “I wish I was less proud of you and you more alive. I would have liked to continue to love you, by my side”, said the journalist’s mother, Oksana, at his funeral. Words reported Thursday and which upset the audience.
The reporter “had this rare ability to find breaths of life and even I would say poetry in horror. In the midst of chaos and violence, he never failed to document with humanity the daily life of a population struggling for its survival “said Rima Abdul Malak, who read a poem by Jean-Pierre Siméon, taken from the collection Without fixed borders.