PEN Ukraine’s General Meeting: outcomes summarized

On 24-25 January 2026, PEN Ukraine’s General Meeting was held.

General Meeting is PEN Ukraine’s supreme executive body. It’s a venue to discuss strategic questions, sum up the year and prioritize the directions of the organization’s development. The Meeting is held no less often than annually, and it provides consistency of internal processes in accordance with the Statuses of the organization.

This year, 42 members of PEN Ukraine participated live in the General Meeting. This made it possible to involve a wide range of participants.

"PEN Ukraine is one of the world’s most active PEN centers. I consider not just freedom of speech but first and foremost, a much deeper issue of life itself crucial for us in wartime. There is no freedom of speech, but what is provided by lives of those who speak. In our activity, we must keep focused on people’s lives, the life of culture, the life of our country – the life notwithstanding death and war," said Volodymyr Yermolenko, president of PEN Ukraine.

During the two-day-long Meeting, PEN members:

• Summarized PEN Ukraine’s activity in 2025
• Discussed current challenges and ways to address them
• Planned the organization’s activity for the upcoming years
• Shaped the plans for next events and projects.

The Meeting was facilitated by Oleksandra Baklanova, an expert in change management, strategy, and marketing.

The General Meeting is also a venue for live communication and human contact between people who work in the common field of values. Such meetings strengthen the bonds inside PEN and let it remain a composed and active community, sensitive and responsive to the context.

PEN Ukraine is a cultural and human rights organization uniting Ukrainian journalists, writers, scholars, publishers, translators, and human rights activists. Established in 1989, it is among 139 national centers of PEN International. PEN Ukraine’s activity is aimed to protect the freedom of speech and the authors’ rights, promotion of Ukrainian literature and culture, advocating values and standards of independent journalism, and establishing international cultural cooperation. PEN Ukraine is a co-founder of the Vasyl Stus Prize, the Yuri Shevelyov Prize, the George Gongadze Prize, and Drahomán Prize. The organization includes 189 members.

The General Meeting was supported by the International Renaissance Foundation.