(CNN) A French journalist working for the international news agency Agence France-Presse (AFP) was killed in a rocket attack near the city of Bakhmut in eastern Ukraine on Tuesday.
Arman Soldin, 32, was AFP’s video coordinator in Ukraine, and AFP was killed in a rocket attack on the outskirts of the town of Chasiv Yar near Bakhmut. announced on TwitterQuoting colleagues who witnessed the incident.
“We are devastated to learn of the death of AFP video journalist Arman Soldin in eastern Ukraine today,” AFP said. “All our thoughts go out to his family and loved ones.”
Soldin was with four colleagues at the time of the attack, but other journalists were not injured, the news agency said.
According to AFP, their reporting team was with Ukrainian soldiers when they opened fire around 4:30 p.m. local time on Tuesday.
Soldin, a French citizen of Bosnian descent, is a veteran reporter who regularly travels to the front lines, the news agency said. He has been AFP’s video coordinator since September 2022 Conflict since the early days of the invasion of Russia.
“Our journalists regularly travel to the region to report on the conflict in the region, which has been at the heart of the fighting in Ukraine for months,” AFP said in its statement.
Soldin is one of several known journalists killed since Russia’s full-scale invasion began, including a Fox News photojournalist. Pierre Zakrzewski and consultant Oleksandra “Sasha” Guvshinova, journalist and documentarian Brent Renaudand photojournalist Max Levin.
Born in Sarajevo, Arman was expelled to France in 1992 when the Bosnian war broke out, and he told AFP in an interview last year that “stories about refugees affect me”. According to To the agency’s dismay.
He joined the AFP in Rome in 2015 and his first staff post was in London later that year, the news agency reported.
Following the news of his death, there was an outpouring of grief and condolences from his friends and colleagues.
“The entire agency is devastated by the loss of Armaan,” AFP chief executive officer Fabrice Fries said, according to the news agency. “His death is a terrible reminder of the risks and dangers journalists face on a daily basis when covering the conflict in Ukraine.”
Soldin had earlier this month His video camera rolls As he and his team of journalists came under rocket fire near the front lines.
“Stuck with a bunch of trench diggers in the rain yesterday in Grad was one of the worst things I’ve ever experienced from Ukraine, with rockets exploding less than 50 meters away,” he wrote. “Pure terror.”
Colleagues who worked with Soldin in Ukraine described him in comments posted on Twitter as a “courageous and determined journalist” and “full of enthusiasm for life”.
A video released as a tribute showed him singing an ’80s pop song and laughing “Forever Young” while driving with colleagues in April 2022.
In the last one of Soldin Twitter threads, he posted a series of videos of the group rescuing a porcupine at the bottom of a ditch from Russian shelling in Chasiv Yar. Soldin took the hedgehog back to the base and fed it by hand.
“Arman was the kind of guy who saved wounded hedgehogs in war zones. He was an incredible and vibrant personality and a great journalist. We miss him. We mourn him. Rest in peace,” AFP’s deputy news editor Jonathan Brown said. Moscow and Kiev, on Twitter.
French President Emmanuel Macron has expressed condolences over Soldin’s death. says on Twitter: “We share the pain of his family and all his colleagues.”
“Courageously, he was at the forefront to establish the facts from the first hour of the conflict. To inform us. We share the pain of his loved ones and all his colleagues.”
Serhii Kislitsia, Ukraine’s Ambassador to the UN called soldin A “remarkable journalist” who “gave his life for his courage.”
“My condolences to his loved ones. Respect to all those who take enormous risks to speak the truth about the horrors of the war in Ukraine,” he said.
Soldin, from Kramatorsk in eastern Ukraine, celebrated his 32nd birthday on March 21, AFP wrote in their obituary.
“A nice bottle was opened for the occasion and a colleague took out his guitar,” his colleague Antoine Lambroschini told AFP.
“Armaan had a happy little smile on his face.”
CNN’s Xiaofei Xu, Duarte Mendonca and Jo Shelley contributed.
“Total coffee junkie. Tv ninja. Unapologetic problem solver. Beer expert.”