In 20 Facts, Know Controversial Journalist Graham Phillips

Even though he calls himself a 100% independent journalist and repeatedly denies being a propagandist for Russia, British journalist Graham Phillips has been placed under UK sanctions against individuals and entities with ties to Russia following its military invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. But who is Graham Phillips and what does he do?

Graham Phillips is a British journalist who is currently working from the war front in Ukraine, except that he is one of few Western journalists with loud support for the Russian military operation, which has led to the British government's decision to impose sanctions on him, confiscating his money and house back in the UK.

In the following listicle, we will take a look at everything Graham Philips did before the 2022 Russian war in Ukraine.

Who is Journalist Graham Phillips?

Source: Facebook

1- Graham Philips was born in 1979 and graduated with a dual degree in philosophy and history from the University of Dundee.

2- Upon graduation, Graham Philips worked as a clerk at the former Central Office of Information which provided reports on government online websites to the Parliament of the United Kingdom.

3- His first interaction with Ukraine was a trip he made to Dnipropetrovsk in 2009 to attend a football game played by England's national team, which prompted him to move to the country at the age of 30.

4- Upon moving to Ukraine, Graham Philips made a living by teaching English.

5- Graham Philips then started a blog documenting his experiences in Ukraine, including writing about social and political aspects of life in the country.

6- In 2012, Graham Philips landed a job with What's On magazine where he worked from Ukraine's capital Kyiv.

7- Then Graham Philips worked as a freelance journalist writing for the UK's New Statesman and Ukraine's, Kyiv Post, Pravda, and others. 

8- In his articles, Graham Philips heavily attacked the Svoboda political party in Ukraine and its leader Stepan Bandera, calling them "neo Nazis".

9- In 2013, Graham Philips published a book named Ukraine – Men, Women, Sex, Murder, in which he highlighted the death of British businessman Barry Pring, who was killed in a hit-and-run near Kyiv. Graham Philips had then accused Pring's Ukrainian wife Ganna Ziuzina of killing the millionaire, which had caused a ban on sales of the book following a lawsuit by Ganna Ziuzina.

10- During the same year, Graham Philips expressed his opposition to the Maidan protests also known as the Revolution of Dignity that ousted the pro-Russia leader Viktor Yanukovych. At that time, he started working for the Russian-state RT before joining them officially during the war in Donbas in 2014. 

11- One month into the military conflict, Graham Philips was arrested by the Ukrainian army in Mariupol in May 2014, but he was released hours later after being expelled from Ukraine. 

12- During the summer of 2014, Graham Philips violated his agreement with the Ukrainian army and re-entered the country. Yet, he was detained at the Donetsk international airport, before being transferred to Poland and banned from entering Ukraine for three years for "promoting Russian propaganda".

13- In August of the same year, Graham Philips once again violated the ban and entered Ukraine illegally. In November 2014, he sustained injuries in the back by shrapnel while in Donbas. He continued to report on the war events for several years to come.

14- In September 2016, Graham Philips prompted nationwide outrage in Ukraine after a video that showed him as he berated a Ukrainian war prisoner who had lost his both hands moments before his handover to Ukrainian forces within a prisoner swap. 

15- In 2016, Graham Philips returned briefly to the UK to report on the vote for Brexit, one he had openly supported. 

17- After the Russian personality, Elizaveta Glinka died in the crash of a Russian Defence Ministry jetliner crashed in 2016, Graham Philips created a film about her life, citing their friendship. 

18- In 2018, Graham Philips traveled to Germany's Munich where he attacked and vandalized the grave of the Ukrainian nationalist politician Stepan Bandera who he describes as a "Nazi".

19- In 2019, Graham Philips traveled to Kosovo and shot several films, after which he described the country as a "terrorist state" and the Kosovo Liberation Army as a "terrorist organization", leading to his ban from the country.

20- Covering UK Black Lives Matter protests, Graham Philips expressed his opposition to the movement.