The Russians have killed hundreds of Ukrainian athletes and are also destroying stadiums and sports fields in the attacked country. The fates of several Ukrainian athletes and coaches are captured in a new documentary film by journalists Marek Vítek and Radan Šprongl. They have already experienced several wars, but according to them, the one in Ukraine is different. “No one can predict where the Russians will kill,” says Vítek. And he protests that they compete in the Olympics.
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Journalist Marek Vítek spoke to Aktuálně.cz about his new documentary, which maps the difficult situation of athletes in Ukraine. | Video: Radek Bartoníček | Video: Radek Bartoníček
“During the Russian aggression, over 400 Ukrainian athletes and coaches were killed, the sports infrastructure is damaged or outright destroyed in many places, many young athletes have become refugees,” explains Marek Vítek. In the 1990s, he worked on Nova and Czech Television, filming in several war zones and mapping the activities of Czech soldiers on foreign missions. His documentary just being finished production company A-NEWS but he considers Ukrainian athletes to be the most important.
It was originally supposed to be simply called Sport and War, but in the end they decided on something else. During the filming, they were most interested in the desire of many Ukrainian athletes to defend their country and sometimes lay down their lives for it. That’s why they named the picture Character: Athlete.
“Radan and I realized that athletes want to fight and want to win, they have it in their DNA. That’s why Ukrainian athletes were often among the first volunteers who signed up for the war, saying they would win,” explains Vítek. It is based on interviews he conducted in Ukraine, among other things, with relatives of athletes who died on the front or were hit by Russian missiles.
Russia will use the Olympics in propaganda
“We shot eight portraits, among which are young athletes who had to leave Ukraine because of the war, returned there, but in the end will use the program of the Canadian government and will continue to play sports in Canada,” says the journalist. In the documentary, he also captured a Ukrainian swimmer, whose example shows how difficult it is to prepare for this year’s Olympics in Paris in domestic conditions.
“This is a junior world champion in swimming who will compete in the Olympics. But he has to prepare in very difficult conditions. After the Russian attack, the pool was damaged and he and other people had to put it together in order to continue his preparation,” he says. In the documentary, people will also learn about the fate of Makar Jerofjeev, a hockey defenseman from Dnipro who fell on the front. Or Dmytro Serbin, an American football player from Kyiv. This renowned heart surgeon volunteered as a doctor and fell while evacuating the wounded at the front. A rocket killed Ukrainian basketball legend Viktor Kobzysty in Lviv or boxing coach Mikhail Korenovsky in Dnipro,” Vítek enumerates.
The Russians destroyed hundreds of stadiums, sports grounds and swimming pools, thousands of athletes fled abroad before the war. According to him, therefore, they have no right to participate in the Olympic Games in Paris. And not even under a neutral flag, as the International Olympic Committee decided.
“Athletes should have equal conditions in preparation. But how do athletes in Ukraine have such conditions compared to those in Russia? In addition, while preparing the documentary, I saw how Russia is able to use the achievements of Russian athletes for its politics in a huge way for propaganda purposes. I have no doubt that it will even in case of success at the Olympics. And it won’t matter at all that they won’t start under the Russian flag,” he says.
No one can guess where the Russians will kill
People will see the documentary for the first time on May 7 at the Atlas cinema in Prague, after which it will go to other smaller cinemas. For example, on June 26, he will screen it Institute of Memory of the Nation in Pardubice, where there will also be a discussion. In the first half of June, the documentary will appear on the screens of Czech Television. Other stations, including foreign ones, are also interested in him.
“Hopefully we’ll get everything done, we’re still editing the documentary and doing a lot of other things on it. Whether it’s graphics or Czech subtitles, for example. There’s still a lot of work to do,” admits Vítek, who previously worked together with Sprongle as a television reporter.
Twenty years ago, he founded the production company A-NEWS, in which, among other things, they shot a lot of documentaries. For example, the first one, called The Devil in Us, captured the well-known photographer Jan Šibík while photographing the war in Liberia. Since then, they have waged war in several other countries, but according to Vítek, none was as specific as the one in Ukraine.
“When we filmed war conflicts in the past, there was always a certain line on which the fight was fought. And if you went a few tens or hundreds of kilometers away, you could live relatively peacefully. But in Ukraine, it’s different. Not everyone in the Czech Republic realizes that the war there also affects many people who live far from the front line. No one can predict where the Russian missiles will land and where they will kill again,” says Vítek.
Video: “How is this possible. They helped Israel, we have to put up with it,” described a journalist from Ukraine
“How is this possible? They helped Israel, we have to put up with it,” described a journalist from Ukraine | Video: Martin Novák
