Team
Asami Terajima photo

Asami Terajima

Reporter

Asami Terajima is a reporter at the Kyiv Independent covering Ukrainian military affairs and front-line developments. She is the co-author of the weekly War Notes newsletter. She previously worked as a business reporter for the Kyiv Post, focusing on international trade, infrastructure, investment, and energy. Originally from Japan, Terajima moved to Ukraine during childhood and completed her bachelor's degree in Business Administration in the U.S. She is the winner of the Thomson Reuters Foundation's Kurt Schork Award in International Journalism 2023 (Local Reporter category) and the George Weidenfeld Prize, awarded as part of Germany's Axel Springer Prize 2023. She was also featured on the Media Development Foundation's 2023 "25 under 25: Young and Bold" list of emerging media makers in Ukraine. She is among the finalists for the U.K.'s One World Media Award 2026 in the Print category and the French Bayeux Calvados-Normandy award 2025 for war correspondents in the Young Reporter category.

For media & speaking inquiries:
press@kyivindependent.com

Articles

'Utterly baffling': Ukrainians outraged, call for protest after Zelensky ousts Fedorov

This is a developing story and is being updated. President Volodymyr Zelensky's dismissal of Mykhailo Fedorov as defense minister has drawn a wave of criticism from soldiers, veterans, and civil society figures, who argue Ukraine is losing one of its most effective wartime officials without an adequate explanation. Dmytro Koziatynskyi, a war veteran who was a leading organizer of last summer's mass protests against a law curbing the independence of Ukraine's anti-corruption agencies, called fo
destroyed property at the site of a Russian night attack in Vyshneve, Kyiv Oblast, Ukraine, on July 6, 2026.

'Everything just kept detonating' — Devastating Russian attack hits quiet Kyiv suburb of Vyshneve

Residents of the small town of Vyshneve, on Kyiv's western edge, have described scenes of terror amid Russia's latest devastating missile and drone attack on the capital, as they found themselves fleeing a series of massive explosions after a strike on the town. "A huge mushroom cloud rose into the sky. Burning fragments kept flying behind us. They were so high, but it felt like everything was on fire," Diana Liashchuk, 21, told the Kyiv Independent. "I called my mom just to tell her not to wo

Inside the Ukrainian military's fight to motivate new recruits

by Asami Terajima
KHARKIV OBLAST — New recruits walk into a small, overcrowded log-framed tent, taking their place in the line for lunch to fuel up for the long day of training ahead. The line ends at two large steaming pots: one filled with potato-and-bean soup, the other with sausages. Laughter and chatter from those who arrived early enough to be the first to eat bring warmth to what could otherwise be a bleak atmosphere. The recruits would soon be deployed to the front, many of them about to face the harshes