The European Film Academy has joined the massive global sanctions currently in effect against Russia and fully supports the call of the Ukrainian Film Academy to boycott Russian film as expressed: https://chng.it/GFywhGb4SX.
The Academy strongly condemns the war started by Russia - Ukraine's sovereignty and territory must be respected. Putin's actions are unacceptable, and we strongly condemn them.
What concerns us most is the fate of the Ukrainians, and especially the Ukrainian filmmaking community. We are fully aware that several of our members are fighting with arms in protest against this war. The Academy will therefore exclude Russian films from this year's European Film Awards and we lend our support to each element of the boycott.
The European Film Academy remains a place to support and unite all filmmakers who share our belief in human dignity, freedom, democracy, equality, rule of law, and human rights. We acknowledge and appreciate those brave filmmakers in Russia who stand up against this war. But in view of a brutal and unjustified attack, we have to stand with our brothers and sisters in Ukraine whose lives are at risk.
We acknowledge that this reaction should have come at an earlier point in the past days, but our democratic processes needed to be followed. Whilst those took place, the European Film Academy has, in parallel and working quietly behind the scenes, managed to raise funds and put together support structures.
We therefore take this opportunity to unequivocally express our protest against this abominable war and to re-confirm and reiterate our complete and total solidarity with the people of Ukraine.
WHAT CAN YOU DO?
SIGN THE STATEMENT
We gladly share with you the following statement by fellow academy members Denis Krupnov and Anna Krupnova (Russia) as well as Edvinas Pukšta (Lithuania), and Ilya Medovyy (Russia/Israel):
We, members of the European Film Academy, declare our strongest protest and unequivocal opposition to the Russian military aggression against the independent sovereign country of Ukraine. We express our solidarity with the people of Ukraine and say NO to war. We demand Russia to halt immediately all military activities in Ukraine.
If you wish to add your name as a signatory, please send an e-mail to press@europeanfilmacademy.org by tomorrow, Wednesday, 2 March, 13.00 CET. We will then publish this statement with a list of all signatories tomorrow afternoon.
DONATE
If you wish to support the work of the International Coalition for Filmmakers at Risk (which the European Film Academy is a co-founding partner of), you can donate to
Bank account: Stichting ICFR
IBAN: NL 02 TRIO 0320 0470 40
BIC/SWIFT: TRIONL2U
Please mention in the payment description: "Donation ICFR for Ukraine"
01.03.2022 | European Film Awards's blog
Cat. : PEOPLE