Since the escalation of the war in February 2022, until mid-October 2024, nearly 6.8 million refugees4 from Ukraine have been recorded – 92 per cent of them in Europe. Inside Ukraine, an estimated 3.6 million people5 remain internally displaced as of October 2024.
Among the most vulnerable are also an estimated 12.6 million as of March 2025 people who were not displaced from their homes but who have been directly affected by the war – they have been wounded, their homes have been destroyed, their family members died.
Civilian infrastructure, such as power grids, water supply networks. hospitals transportation infrastructure, have been targeted by the daily missile attacks, severely disrupting people’s lives across the whole country, and particularly in the East.
13.06.2022
We have known Yevhen since the first hours of the war in Ukraine. On the 24th of February everything changed in this country and in the lives of its people. Yevhen’s life is no longer the same as it was before the first bombs fell on the Ukrainian capital. From a professional boxer he became an efficient organiser of help for those who did not flee Kiev. These are mainly elderly, sick people for whom fleeing the war was beyond their strength and financial possibilities. They are residents of the 13th district of Kiev. One of the poorest.
Yevhen took care of those who had stayed behind. He provided them with hot meals, water and pet food. He takes us to the primary school. We greet the headmistress and go below ground. “For the first two months, 500 people lived in the basement under the classrooms. We did not move anywhere from here. The bare walls were teeming with life. We organised birthday parties for children, we played games, and we talked a lot with each other. After the Kiev area was liberated, it was difficult for us to part. We came out of the underground and decided to meet again next year, on the 24th of February, and from then on we will celebrate the anniversary of our time together in hiding,” says the school’s headmistress.
The school’s basements are now empty, but Yevhen continues helping. He makes his way to the area around Chernihiv, and went to Bucha, Irpin and Borodyanka on the second day after they were liberated. “There were still bodies lying in the streets. It was a horrible sight, but at the same time we found people who were already clearing their houses of rubble, tidying up the yards and trying to settle down again. It’s always best to be at home,” smiles Yevhen. We arrive at the village of Teterivske. Out of 800 buildings only 30 have survived. 75 people have returned to the village so far. All they have today are mined fields and piles of rubble. But they also have memories. They want things to be as they were before, so they don’t move anywhere and slowly clean up the village.
Since the beginning of the Russian attack, aid has reached 35,000 people thanks to Yevhen. Most of them are in the east, closer to the front line, where 81 tonnes of humanitarian aid has made it so far. This is still necessary, but we are also working to help the people of Kiev and the surrounding villages to regain their independence. More details will follow soon. Follow our coverage from Kiev.
If you are willing and able to do this work with us, join the fundraiser “To Help Ukraine!”
30.01.2024
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12.06.2023
To our questions about estimated casualty numbers, the most common answer is: “A lot! On both sides!”. Exactly how many no one knows, because getting aid to the occupied territories is like asking the aggressor for an open day in his trenches. On the 11th of June, the Russians fired on a boat with civilians […]
02.05.2023
What if this was your neighbourhood? If, between the billowing smoke, you spotted the ruins of the grocery store where you had shopped since you were a child? To which your mother would still send you with a list written in pencil on a piece of paper so you wouldn’t forget anything? Bachmut had more […]
