"20 days in Mariupol" – Film screening and lecture with Prof. Michael Kimmage

Under the title "20 Days in Mariupol", the US Embassy, together with the Competence Network Interdisciplinary Ukrainian Studies (KIU) and the European University Viadrina, invites you to a film screening with accompanying lecture on Wednesday, November 27, 6 p.m. in the main building of the Viadrina, Große Scharrnstraße 59, Frankfurt (Oder).

The evening will begin with a lecture by renowned US historian Prof. Michael Kimmage on the origins of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022. The professor and head of the Department of History at the Catholic University of America, Washington D.C., traces how the origins of the war also influence its further course. Afterwards, the philosopher Prof. Mykhailo Minakov will give a commentary. He is Senior Advisor at the Kennan Institute of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington and Professor at the Free University in Riga. He is currently a fellow of the Interdisciplinary Ukrainian Studies Competence Network at Viadrina.

Finally, the Oscar-winning documentary film "20 Days in Mariupol" will be shown. The film shows the work of a team from the Associated Press (AP) news agency, who were the only journalists to remain in besieged Mariupol and document the atrocities of the Russian invasion. The film was directed by Ukrainian war correspondent, filmmaker and Pulitzer Prize winner Mstyslav Chernov.

The event is sponsored by the German Academic Exchange Service and will be held in German and English. The film will be shown in the original language with German subtitles.

About the person

Michael Kimmage is Professor and Head of the Department of History at the Catholic University of America. His most recent book, Collisions: The War in Ukraine and the Origins of the New Global Instability (2024), is dedicated to the war in Ukraine.

From 2014 to 2017, he was a member of the Office of Policy Planning at the US State Department, where he was responsible for Russia and Ukraine. Kimmage has been a visiting professor at Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München and Freie Universität Berlin, among others. He is currently a Richard C. Holbrooke Fellow at the American Academy Berlin.

Prof. Mykhailo Minakov is Senior Advisor at the Kennan Institute of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars and Professor at the Free University in Riga. He is editor-in-chief of The Ideology and Politics Journal of Kennan Focus Ukraine. Minakov has been teaching and researching at various universities in Ukraine, Germany, Italy, Switzerland and the USA for over 20 years.