Image reporter for BFM-TV, Frédéric Leclerc-Imhoff was 32 years old.
It is 11 a.m. on May 24. In Bakhmout, Serguii Gaïdaï, the governor of the Luhansk region, has just given the green light. Paris Match can board the armored Mercedes truck given by a British NGO to the Severodonestk police in order to convey water and food to the neighboring town of Lyssychantsk and then to evacuate civilians. The road that connects Bakhmout to Lyssychiantk runs along the front. It is dangerous, within sniper range and hit by mortar fire. The governor issues a condition: only one person from Paris Match will take place on board. The truck is full of water packs in the back. We have to split the team. Priority is given to our photographer: Frédéric Lafargue. He gets into the truck with three policemen equipped like soldiers and led by Viktor Levchenko. In the cabin, the tension rises after twenty minutes on the road. The men put on their helmets: “We promised our mothers to wear them,” smiles Viktor. The news is bad on the front. The Russians are advancing.
During Frédéric’s excursion, Sergei, our translator and myself, we move on a road which joins the path of the Mercedes truck on its first third, at the height of Soledar. We see mortars and cluster bombs falling there regularly. Viktor makes the same observation. He decides to extend the journey via a track that is certainly bumpy, but further from the fire. Arrived on the spot without incident, the men proceed to the distribution of food while a mortar shell explodes nearby. A burning shrapnel falls next to the truck. Then the police begin to evacuate the civilians. Arduous task. Most refuse to leave their homes. “We try to make them understand that their life is worth more than their possessions, but until the war has really come to them, they don’t want to leave, and when it comes, it’s too late”, sums up Viktor. Without contact with Frédéric for several hours, we finally find him at 7 p.m. in Bakhmout. Only three people agreed to be evacuated.
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Six days after him, on May 30, Frédéric Leclerc-Imhoff, 32, image reporter at BFM-TV for 6 years, takes the same place aboard the armored Mercedes truck with an armed escort. In the back, the editor and the translator managed to find a place. The team is taking the same route as Paris Match, but the front has come close. On the road to Lyssyshansk, a mortar shell falls near the truck, a shard passes through the armored windshield and kills the journalist.
We had met the BFM team at the hotel in Kramatorsk where many reporters are staying. They had just arrived in the Donbass after having worked in Mykolaiev. They were serious, meticulous, the loading of their car was much better scheduled than that of Paris Match. Trained at the IJBA, Frédéric was completing his second trip to Ukraine since the start of the war. He was happy to be there, worried too. Humble, attentive to the risks, he did not hesitate to ask their opinion of more experienced reporters: “He called me every day to find out what I thought of their program, says Florian Litzler of TF1, always on the spot. That morning he did too. They hesitated. But the conditions were good, under escort, in an armored vehicle, with a story. They told me that despite everything, they weren’t sure, but they went anyway. To do their job, because they wanted to tell the story of these people. Frédéric Leclerc-Imhoff is the eighth journalist killed since the start of the conflict.
His mother’s letter to Tass and RPL officials claiming he was a mercenary
“Hello. I am the mother of the young journalist you killed yesterday. Your post makes me sick. Of course, you are cowardly trying to clear yourself of customs, but know that you will never succeed in sullying his memory. Everyone here knows his professional and personal commitment to democracy, human respect and above all free, impartial and honest information, all notions that seem far removed from what drives you.
Today, my thoughts go out to all the Ukrainian mothers who mourn their children, all the Ukrainian children who mourn their parents and all the Russian mothers who saw their young people leave too soon as soldiers, who will not see them again and who wonder why .
At least I, despite the pain, know why my son died. One day, those truly responsible for this criminal nonsense will be held accountable.”