Themes by tag: volunteers

Viktor Dudko, a potter, holds clay therapy sessions for defenders who were injured or wounded in the war. Sessions take place at a pottery school near Lutsk. They are free.

Soldiers work at the potter’s wheel and create plates, cups, glasses or vases. Defenders often dedicate clay objects that they create themselves to their loved ones and sign them with “for my beloved wife” or “for my daughter.”

Such clay therapy sessions have been taking place for almost a year. More than a hundred defenders visited it during this time. For a fee everyone is welcome to Viktor’s workshops in pottery. The potter then sends the funds to help the Armed Forces of Ukraine.

Background: Potter Viktor Dudko became famous in Ukraine last year when he made two clay models of the russian cruiser “Moskva,” which was sunk by the Defense Forces of Ukraine.

• military
• volunteers
• Lutsk

Colonel Monte and Colonel Chuck from the U.S. call themselves the “Traveling Colonels.” They are retired US Marine Corps officers, both are Iraq War veterans. The men help Ukraine: they bring medical and other supplies purchased, in particular, with funds donated by U.S. citizens. All this is transferred to the Ukrainian military at the front.

Monte and Chuck, together with volunteers from Ukraine, Canada and the U.S., prepared and packed 1,167 IFAKS (Individual First Aid Kit — standard individual first aid kit in NATO member state) and 16 medical bags this week in Kyiv.

Journalists will have an opportunity to talk with Colonel Monte in Kyiv over the next week.

For reference: Colonel Monte first came to Poland to help Ukrainian refugees in April 2022 and worked with World Central Kitchen. Then he went to Ukraine, now this is his 10th trip. Colonel Chuck made 7 trips. Currently, he is not in Ukraine.

• military
• volunteers
• Kyiv

The French foundation AFUF (Association of Ukrainian Women in France) is handing over 4 ambulances and 4 off-road vehicles to Ukraine for some AFU brigades. The vehicles are equipped with medical hardware and medicines provision on board. That’s a third mission of this foundation, focusing on purchasing ambulances and evacuation vehicles.

Journalists can engage with the benefactors in Lviv, Kyiv, or, whenever possible, in the frontline area. There are French-Ukrainian in-house translators. 

The Foundation implements the mission in cooperation with the Charitable Foundation Harmata Volunteers. 

• volunteers

Stefan came to Ukraine from Finland. He is an entrepreneur consulting asset and fund management companies and a fund management director, previously working in Luxembourg. He attained education in accounting and law. 

The foreigner decided to help Ukrainians and joined the Brave to Rebuild project volunteers in early October. He dismantled the rubble of destroyed buildings in the Kyiv region. In addition, the volunteer helped make concrete for masons and dug a trench for a water supply system.

The man believes that the war in Ukraine is highly illustrative of the battle between good and evil that a person can witness nowadays.

Journalists are welcome to talk to Stefan during his volunteer work in the Kyiv region.

• reconstruction
• volunteers
• Kyiv

With the all-out enemy invasion outbreak, Artem Rakitin took up evacuating civilians from Chernihiv, a city in the country’s north that Russians encircled last spring. Artem gathered a team of volunteers to evacuate those who had no means of transport and were unable to leave the war zone. The team brought humanitarian aid and military ammunition to Chernihiv.

When Russia withdrew forces from the north of Ukraine, and there was no more need for emergency evacuation, Artem decided to serve as an active-duty soldier and joined the Defence Intelligence of Ukraine. The serviceman took part in combat operations in the most dangerous areas of the frontline. Recently, the defender was wounded during an enemy assault. A Russian tank managed to hit the Ukrainian position Artem was defending.

Artem Rakitin is undergoing treatment in Kyiv and is ready to talk to journalists online and offline.

• military
• volunteers

Valentyna Tkach is a third-generation weaver. Her mother was taught this craft by her grandfather, and her mother taught Valentyna herself.

When the full-blown began, Valentyna’s son was mobilized. Later, he asked his mother to raise money for a military vehicle. The woman chose her best products and started selling them on social media. The car was purchased very quickly. Valentyna decided that her carpets could help buy necessary things for Ukrainian defenders. So she continued to put her work up for sale and donate the proceeds to the army. Now the weaver is working on raising money for a thermal imaging drone.

• culture
• military
• volunteers
• women

On October 21, Dobrobat volunteers will clean up a kindergarten damaged in a helicopter crash in Brovary in Kyiv Oblast from rubbles. 

January 18, 2023 helicopter crash killed 14 people: the aircraft crew and all passengers, as well as a child and adult civilians at the crash site. The leadership of the Ministry of Internal Affairs who were on board: Minister Denys Monastyrskyi, State Secretary of the Ministry Yurii Lubkovych, and First Deputy Minister Yevhen Yenin were among the onboard victims. 25 people were injured (including 11 children).

For reference: Dobrobat is a volunteer building division assisting victims in the urgent restoration of housing and social infrastructure in the de-occupied territories.

• casualties
• dead
• reconstruction
• volunteers
• Kyiv

The Warrior Cup III competition will take place in the Lviv region on October 21-22. This tournament was founded in 2021 by veterans Serhii Shymchak, Pavlo Luchkiv, and Dmytro Sydoruk, and volunteer Mariana Salashnyk for other veterans and military personnel.

Dmytro Sydoruk was killed last April during the full-scale Russian invasion. Serhii and Pavlo will hold the third Warrior Cup competition in Dmytro’s memory. Apart from archery, athletics (that involves competitive running and shot put) and table tennis are a part of the tournament this time, as Dmytro’s dream was to develop the competition.

For reference: Serhii Shymchak is a combatant of 2014-2015 military action as a member of the Lviv Volia Volunteer Battalion and the 24th Brigade of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, and from February 2022 to January 2023, he served in the 206th Territorial Defense Battalion of the Kyiv 241st Brigade. Serhii is also a Sports Ambassadors project participant, implemented by Come Back Alive NGO supported by the US Embassy in Ukraine, in partnership with the Games Invictus Ukraine NGO. The project brings together 20 proactive and motivated leaders of the veteran community with visible and invisible injuries and wounds experienced in sports and who are ready to try new adaptive activities.

• military
• volunteers
• Lviv

On October 23, a sports ground and a rehabilitation ward will be opened at the Kyiv Regional Mental Health Center. The occupiers seized the center at the beginning of the full-blown war. Russian soldiers stole valuable equipment and severely damaged the Center while living in the facility. In particular, the windows and doors were smashed. After the de-occupation, the medical center reconstruction began. 

The philanthropists who contributed to the restoration of the Center, as well as the first captain of the Ukrainian national team at the Invictus Games, champion of the Games, commander Oleksandr Pysarenko (to train patients exercises on the playground) will attend the new sports ground opening. 

Journalists will also be able to interview the institution’s management and talk to doctors and patients as far as possible. 

For reference: The Kyiv Regional Mental Health Center is a healthcare institution providing qualified inpatient physical health assessment, treatment, and social and labor rehabilitation for patients with mental disorders.

• casualties
• doctors
• reconstruction
• volunteers
• Kyiv

Yana Biletska engaged in volunteer work in hospices back in 2011, long before the full-blown war began. Later, she founded the NGO Healthy Nation – Future of Ukraine. When the great war broke out, Yana never had any intention of leaving Kharkiv. She knew she could be useful in the city. Together with a team of like-minded people, Yana founded the Hub Vokzal volunteer association, which began delivering humanitarian aid to the residents of Slobozhanshchyna. During the year and a half of the enemy invasion, the association took care of 22 communities in the Kharkiv region, each numbering thousands of people, both locals and IDPs.

• volunteers
• women