A gunman on Friday shot and killed Iryna Farion, a prominent Ukrainian nationalist and former member of parliament, on a street in the western city of Lviv. Farion, 60, was known for her vocal campaigns to defend the Ukrainian language and had been a vocal critic of Russian influence in Ukraine.
Police are conducting an extensive search for the alleged shooter and have not yet ruled out either political or personal motives for the attack. Lviv Regional Governor Maksym Kozytskyi confirmed Farion’s death on Telegram after she was rushed to the hospital. Interior Minister Ihor Klymenko, also on Telegram, stated that investigators are exploring both political and personal angles in the case.
President Volodymyr Zelensky, condemning the act of violence, said he is receiving regular updates on the ongoing efforts to apprehend the gunman.
Farion, a linguist by profession, was a member of the nationalist Svoboda (Freedom) party and served in parliament from 2012 to 2014. She was also a member of the Lviv regional council.
She rose to prominence for her outspoken efforts to promote the Ukrainian language and criticize officials who spoke Russian. In 2018, during the ongoing conflict with Russian-backed separatists in eastern Ukraine, she advocated for a forceful response to Russian-speaking citizens. In the initial months following the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, Farion criticized Russian-speaking fighters of the Azov regiment, who defended the port city of Mariupol for three months.
While Ukrainian is the sole official language of Ukraine, a significant portion of the population speaks Russian as their first language, a legacy of Soviet rule when Ukrainian was suppressed. The promotion of the Ukrainian language has long been a contentious issue, with the Ukrainian parliament passing legislation to solidify its use in public life and the service industry.
