Kyiv Independent journalist wins Bayeux Calvados-Normandy award for war correspondents.

The Kyiv Independent's journalist Francis Farrel was announced as the winner of the Bayeux Calvados-Normandy Award for war correspondents in the Young Reporter (print) category on Oct.

14. The award, sponsored by Credit Agricole Normandie, was for Farrel's coverage of the Battle of Bakhmut, a city in Donetsk Oblast that was occupied by Russian forces after 10 months of fierce fighting that nearly razed it to the ground. The annual Bayeux Calvados-Normandy Award has been presented by the French town of Bayeux, in association with the Calvados Department and the Normandy region for more than 20 years "to pay tribute to journalists who work in hazardous conditions to provide us with information."

Farrell was awarded alongside journalists and photographers from CNN, BBC, Le Monde, The Times, RTS-France Info, Getty Images, and others.

'They crawl forward 24/7:' On the zero line with Ukrainian infantry north of Bakhmut Climbing to a firing position through trenches dug into black Ukrainian soil, the relative quiet in the air is only reassuring to an extent. At the most forward point, a Soviet-era recoilless rifle stands watch, dug into a shallow depression in the ground.

Bohdan, a company comman...

Since he joined the Kyiv Independent in August 2022, Farrell has mostly covered Russia's war against Ukraine, reporting from some of the hottest spots along the front line. Aside from the Battle of Bakhmut, he has covered the liberation of Kharkiv and Kherson oblasts, as well as the ongoing counteroffensive in Zaporizhzhia Oblast and Donetsk Oblast. Before joining the Kyiv Independent, Farrell worked as a freelance journalist and documentary photographer and also was the managing editor at the online media project Lossi 36.

Farrell has previously worked in OSCE and Council of Europe field missions in Albania and Ukraine. He is an alumnus of Leiden University in The Hague and University College London.

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