Human rights campaign for the Day of Empty Chairs held in Kyiv

The “Empty Chairs” campaign was held on November 16, 2024, to support journalists, writers, artists, and human rights defenders who are missing, imprisoned, or held captive due to the Russia-Ukraine war. The event took place at Sophia Square in Kyiv and was organized by PEN Ukraine and the Center for Civil Liberties. 

Participants set up a symbolic installation of empty chairs bearing the names of imprisoned, captive, and missing individuals. Some chairs carried plaques reading “Name Unknown.”

The event was attended by relatives and friends of those imprisoned and missing, including: 

• Maryna Aleksandrovych, wife of poet Mykola Leonovych, who went missing in April 2023;
• Ivan Andrusyak, friend of poet Borys Humeniuk, who disappeared near Klishchiivka in December 2022;
• Oksana Mykhalevych, lawyer for journalist Dmytro Khylyuk, abducted by Russian forces in March 2022;
• Oleksandra Barkova, sister of Bohdan Ziza, an artist from Crimea unlawfully sentenced to 15 years in prison by the Russian occupational authorities in Crimea in June 2023;
• Oksana Stomina, a Mariupol poet and civic activist, whose husband Dmytro Paskalov, one of the defenders of the Azovstal steel plant, has been held in Russian captivity since May 2022;
• Olena Tsyhipa, wife of Serhii Tsyhipa, a writer and journalist from Nova Kakhovka, sentenced by the so-called “Supreme Court of the Republic of Crimea” to 13 years in a high-security penal colony.

Formerly unlawfully imprisoned journalists Lyudmyla Huseynova and Nariman Dzhelyal, whose names were previously on the chairs, participated in the event this time as guests. 

“Each political prisoner or detainee has their own view outside the window—sometimes there isn’t even one, because the place of imprisonment has no windows,” said Nariman Dzhelyal. “Prisoners are held in basements where they cannot hear the outside world or breathe fresh air. Life’s focus becomes very narrow when you are behind bars. The guards do everything possible to isolate a person from receiving even a fragment of truthful information. But sometimes, the strength of our determination and our desire to deliver even the smallest message manages to break through the thick, meter-long walls of Russian camps and prisons. It’s crucial to continue doing this.”

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Images by Yevhenii Zavhorodniy, PEN Ukraine

Copy editing: Joy Tataryn