KyivNotKiev

KyivNotKiev campaign

KyivNotKiev is an online campaign started by the Ukrainian Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) together with the 15 member centre for strategic communications "StratCom Ukraine" on 2 October 2018. Its goal was to persuade English-language media and organisations to exclusively use Kyiv (derived from the Ukrainian language name Київ instead of Kiev (derived from the Russian language name Киев) as the name of the Ukrainian capital. It is a part of the wider CorrectUA campaign. It is also part of a global trend of city name changes.

Results of the KyivNotKiev campaign

After the campaign began, the name Kyiv instead of Kiev began to be used by Anglophone outlets like the BBC,The Guardian, Associated Press,The Wall Street Journal, The Globe and Mail, The Washington Post, Financial Times, The Economist, The Daily Telegraph, The New York Times and other foreign media. The 'Kyiv' was also adopted by some international organizations. In June 2019, at the request of the United States Department of State, the Embassy of Ukraine to the United States, and Ukrainian organisations in America, the name Kyiv was officially adopted by the United States Board on Geographic Names as the only correct one, which resulted in the federal government of the United States solely using 'Kyiv'. Before that, both names were used.