COLOMBO — March 11, 2026
The Russian Embassy in Sri Lanka has demanded the removal of photographs depicting Russia’s war in Ukraine from the 2025 World Press Photo exhibition, currently on display in Colombo and scheduled to move to Kandy. The Dutch Embassy, a co-organizer of the event, has rejected the request, calling it an infringement on freedom of expression.
The exhibition, organized by the World Press Photo Foundation, the Sri Lanka Press Institute, and the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, opened on Feb. 27 at One Galle Face mall in Colombo. It features award-winning photojournalism from around the world, including images documenting the conflict in Ukraine that began with Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022.
According to a statement from the Dutch Embassy issued on Tuesday, the Russian ambassador visited the exhibition over the March 7-8 weekend and requested that the Ukraine-related photographs be taken down, warning that a protest might be organized if the demand was ignored. The Russian Embassy later approached Sri Lanka’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs with a formal request to remove the images before the exhibition relocates to Sahas Uyana in Kandy from March 13 to 17.
The Dutch Embassy described the intervention as “attempts by any party to compromise people’s right to know and freedom of expression.” It confirmed that the exhibition would proceed in Kandy with all content intact, adding that it was inappropriate for a foreign diplomatic mission to seek to control what the host country’s public could view.
In a rebuttal released the same day, the Russian Embassy rejected the Dutch characterization and defended its position. It described the contested photographs as “biased and anti-Russian,” asserting that the exhibition presented a one-sided view by omitting what it called atrocities committed by “Ukrainian Nazis” in the Donbas region from 2014 to 2022, as well as during Ukraine’s 2024 military actions in Russia’s Kursk region. The statement also accused Western countries of hypocrisy, double standards, and responsibility for the failure of the 2015 Minsk agreements aimed at resolving the earlier conflict in eastern Ukraine.
The Russian Embassy further criticized the Netherlands for supporting what it termed a “puppet regime in Kyiv” and suggested the Dutch government address its own historical issues, including the return of artifacts from Sri Lanka’s colonial era.
Sri Lanka has maintained a policy of nonalignment in the Ukraine conflict, abstaining from several United Nations resolutions condemning Russia’s invasion while preserving economic ties with Moscow and seeking support from Western donors. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs had not issued a public comment on the dispute as of Tuesday evening.
The World Press Photo exhibition, an annual global tour, is displayed in numerous countries and includes the same Ukraine-related images on the foundation’s website. Admission to the Kandy showing is free and open to the public.
