One of the key moments of this year’s festival will undoubtedly be the performance “I Did Not Leave Ukraine” directed by Merle Karusoo. It is a powerful, unsettling testimony of war veterans who speak about their experiences on the frontline and the sacrifices they have made in defending Ukraine. It is also a story of a country paying an enormous price for its independence: according to recent estimates, more than 50,000 war invalids are currently living in Ukraine, and this number is still growing — every month around 1,000 amputations are performed. The trauma of war marks the entire society.
After the performance, we will talk about the situation of the individual and of the state placed in an extreme position, forced to make tragic choices — when every decision carries a very real cost in human lives.
- Does the state have the right to compel its citizens to defend its borders against an invader, or should this decision be left to individual conscience?
- What price are we prepared to pay for a free homeland?
- How should the state and its citizens act when confronted with radical evil?
- And finally: do we have the right to judge those who decided that their own life and health were more important than the fate of their country?
Speakers:
Olha Menko – social activist, president of the Poland–Ukraine Institute Foundation and founder of the information network UAinPoland and the portal UAinKrakow.pl, aimed at the Ukrainian community in Poland. In 2019 she received the Multicultural Ambassadors Award from the Mayor of Kraków for her work on UAinKrakow.pl. She has over ten years of experience in NGOs and media, designing information campaigns and working in media education. Since 2022 she has been actively supporting refugees, co-creating local policies and advising international NGOs and UN agencies on communication with the Ukrainian community. In 2023 she received the Kazimiera Bujwidowa Award for outstanding women of Kraków, in recognition of her contribution to the local community.
Antonina Palarczyk – reporter for Tygodnik Powszechny and psychology student in Katowice. For almost three years she has been reporting from the war in Ukraine. She has covered, among others, the Zaporizhzhia counteroffensive and the Kursk operation from Russian territory, but in her work she focuses above all on the perspective of individual people and specific places rather than on large-scale military operations. She often travels along the frontline by hitchhiking, stays with soldiers, and when necessary sleeps in squatted libraries or in the flats of retired FSB officers.
Ziemowit Szczerek – writer, journalist and reporter, known for exploring the “ends of the world” in his books. Author of Siódemka, Przyjdzie Mordor i nas zje, czyli tajna historia Słowian (Mordor Will Come and Eat Us), Rzeczpospolita zwycięska, Tatuaż z tryzubem (Trident Tattoo), Międzymorze, Wymyślone miasto Lwów (The Imaginary City of Lviv), Via Carpatia, Końce światów, Siwy dym and Cham z kulą w głowie. He writes regularly for Polityka, Gazeta Wyborcza, Tygodnik Powszechny and other outlets.
Moderator:
Michał Olszewski – journalist, writer and head of the foreign desk at Gazeta Wyborcza. Author of books including The Birds Scream Unceasingly, Low-tech, Najlepsze buty na świecie and Do Amsterdamu. Winner of the Ryszard Kapuściński Award for the best book-length reportage, named “Journalist of the Year of Małopolska” and awarded the “Literary Laurel” for his reportage cycle. His texts have received numerous awards and nominations, including for the Gdynia Literary Prize.
