Ukraine’s MFA Condemns Advertising Campaign for Russian Media Outlet for Exploiting Images of Ukrainian Victims

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine has strongly criticized a recent advertising campaign by the Berlin-based creative agency LURE, which featured Ukrainian war victims to promote the Russian media outlet Meduza.

The campaign included footage of a woman crying near a damaged building in Bucha and Yaroslav Bazylevych, whose wife and three daughters were killed in a Russian missile strike on Lviv. Ukraine’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs has demanded the immediate removal of the content from all media platforms where it has appeared.

Tykhyi stated that the use of Ukrainian suffering in promotional materials is unacceptable and that those affected by the war deserve an apology. “We also believe that Ukrainians, whose suffering was cynically exploited, deserve an apology,” he added. In a social media statement, the MFA of Ukraine described the campaign as an example of “marketing cynicism and hypocrisy,” condemning the exploitation of Ukrainian tragedy to evoke sympathy for Russians.

Earlier, a pro bono advertising campaign for the Russian outlet Meduza, created by Berlin-based agency LURE, sparked criticism for using images of Ukrainian war victims to promote the publication. The campaign featured footage from Russian attacks in Ukraine, including destroyed buildings in Borodianka and a mourning father in Lviv. Critics condemned it as exploitative, while LURE defended the project as a global initiative for press freedom.