For the record, I don’t agree with everything that goes into the Kyiv Post.

Chief editor Brian Bonner and I have discussions, often animated, but rarely nuclear and mostly amicable. We both have tempers that flair like cheap fireworks purchased at Loco Joe’s: quickly ignited and as quick to fizzle out.

Because it had been a day from hell and I had been out of the office on print deadline, I missed the opportunity to look at the front page of the Feb. 17 edition that featured Le Crazy Horse cabaret before it went to press.

When I did see it, I was disappointed.

That doesn’t mean that I would have stopped publication, only that I would have exercised my right as the stand-in for the publisher to counsel caution and wonder aloud whether a page and a quarter of semi-nudity was really the Kyiv Post’s style.

Not long ago, I coined the phrase, “The World’s Window on Ukraine,” feeling it best fit the mission and responsibility of the Kyiv Post. Photos of mostly nude dancing girls from a Paris revue, in my view, didn’t fit into that window.

To his credit, Kyiv Post publisher Mohammad Zahoor seems perpetually calm in such situations, asking only that “if we get it wrong, we apologize and correct.”

On the other hand, as with billionaire Dmitry Firtash’s libel lawsuit against the Kyiv Post in a London court, he backs his newspaper to the hilt. The Kyiv Post won that legal battle. Though the newspaper has had to retract and apologize on infrequent occasions, no one has ever waged a successful lawsuit against the paper, evidence of our commitment to be careful, factual and fair.

As I sometimes do, I gently chided in my morning staff memo. Brian had a satirical front page dummied up, making fun of my lack of liberalism. I took it in the spirit intended. Bonner took heat not only from me for the topless women photos, but from other readers as well.

I think that showing nudity is editorially justifiable if it’s part of the story and done tastefully,

– Brian Bonner, Kyiv Post chief editor

His explanation: “Unlike other newspapers, such as Ukraine’s Fakti and until recently Germany’s Bild, the Kyiv Post’s editorial policy since I returned in 2008 is not to use nude photos gratuitously.Those and other newspapers have used nudity as part of their business strategy, arguing that readers are interested, even though there is no journalistic merit in their publication.”

“I think that showing nudity is editorially justifiable if it’s part of the story and done tastefully,” Bonner said. “For instance, it would be silly, in my view, to cover a FEMEN protest without showing the topless protesters, since that is their trademark. With respect to Le Crazy Horse, I thought that the photos helped to tell the story of a very famous cabaret that sold out 10 shows during its first tour in Kyiv.”

However, some readers thought the photos – both quantity (seven) and selection (four featuring topless women) veered into the gratuitous.

And in one of the more unfortunate juxtapositions of editorial content and advertising, the cancellation of an ad at the last minute before deadline led to the insertion on page 21 of the seventh Le Crazy Horse photo next to an employment advertisement from the United Nations for a programme associate for gender and women’s empowerment.

“I met with the UN’s Resident Coordinator Olivier Adam and other UN officials in Kyiv and apologized for publishing those photos next to the UN employment ad. It was a clear mistake on my part,” Bonner said. “Moreover, given the criticism, we will exercise greater care in photo selection in the future, keeping in mind the sensibilities of our readers, and with our decision guided by the answers to these questions: ‘Are the photos relevant to the story? Are they done in good taste?’ There was division in the newsroom about the Le Crazy Horse photos, and not along gender lines, incidentally. The author of the story, Maryna Irkliyenko, and the photo editor, Ganna Bernyk, thought the photos were fine.”

Even good things can come from bad mistakes. I have agreed to give the UN a couple of free ads in compensation, and I will be meeting with Mr. Adam to discuss a long-term advertising program with this indispensible government institution.

There have been other instances in which I have Monday morning quarterbacked. Probably the most controversial edition in my tenure at the Kyiv Post was one that broke two front page exclusives: one which questioned the university dissertation submitted by the president’s son; the other about Akhmetov’s difficulty in obtaining a U.S. visa.

Bonner brought both stories to me. I made a couple of suggestions that I felt strengthened them, and said that I was satisfied.

I would never stand in the way of a thoroughly documented story that at least made an effort to present both sides.

Other than being the person charged with making the newspaper profitable – a Herculean task but we will do it–I have an overall editorial responsibility that came with the job description, even though Bonner makes the final call on stories where legal or other issues, such as the newspaper’s reputation, are not at stake.

Editorial independence — that is the ability of journalists to decide what the news is without any outside interference – is part of the Kyiv Post’s motto.

I have worked for three daily newspapers and a wire service during my career. I have never come across a more brilliant and responsible staff as have been collected under the Kyiv Post roof.

I would put Ukrainian Vlad Lavrov up against any investigative reporter anywhere. The team is led by Bonner who, if this were the 1950s, could be portrayed by Gary Cooper on the silver screen. He has the gravitas for the part, and the honesty of character. From time-to-time, Bonner and I will have our disagreements. I might disagree with content. There will be those Vesuvius eruptions.

But I don’t think fists will fly. We’re both too old for that.

Kyiv Post CEO Michael Willard can be reached at [email protected]