- James Waterhouse
- BBC correspondent in Ukraine
image source,Reuters
Destroyed Russian military vehicles on display in the streets of Kyiv on Independence Day of Ukraine
Few know the price of challenging Russian influence better than Viktor Yushchenko.
The former Ukrainian president was nearly killed and disfigured by poisoning during his campaign in the 2004 election campaign; his then-competitor was a candidate backed by the Moscow authorities.
After the incident, he took the lead against election fraud and won the election the following year, becoming the president of Ukraine.
Sitting in a wooden house outside Kyiv, Yushchenko praised Ukraine’s “power of the national spirit” as the key to Ukraine’s independence.
“Today I can say with confidence that Ukraine’s 42 million people are of one mind, and that’s what allows us to face any enemy, including Russia.”
You can still see the poisoning scars on the former president’s face.
image source,Getty Images
Former Ukrainian President Yushchenko praises Ukrainian national spirit
Ukraine’s Independence Day also coincides with six months into Putin’s invasion of Ukraine. The Ukrainian military said that “nearly a thousand” soldiers were killed during this period. The United Nations has confirmed that 5,500 civilians have died.
believe in winning
Six months into the Ukraine war, the BBC looks back on how the war changed the world
While few here at the time could have predicted the war, Mr Yushchenko believes it was largely due to the West’s historic incompetence in the face of Russian aggression: especially in 2008 conflict in Georgia, and Russia’s annexation of Crimea six years later (2014).
However, Yushchenko believes that the ultimate test of Ukraine has changed its place in the world.
“Today, more than 50 countries have expressed support for our fighting philosophy. They have provided us with all kinds of help – military, financial and humanitarian,” he said.
Today, Yushchenko spends most of his time doing carpentry, and there are a dozen woodcarvings around us. The former Ukrainian president told me that he firmly believes that Ukraine will win this war.
The more Russia tries to bring Ukraine into its orbit, the stronger the national identity of the Ukrainian people.
power of the flag
Ukrainian flag orders surge
In a small factory on the left bank of the Dnieper River in Kyiv, Natalia used to make uniforms for hotels, but now makes Ukrainian flags.
She started receiving order requests from military checkpoints early in the invasion, and now she has more than 2,500 orders a month, not only from the military, but from other businesses as well.
“These colors are very precious to us,” she told me over the noise of the sewing machine.
She said, “Every Ukrainian can feel these colors, we see them everywhere – in the sky, in the wheat fields. It gives us joy, joy and positive emotions because our work is useful. “
Six months into the war in Ukraine, Ukraine faces some disturbing realities. After weeks of discussions, Ukraine’s plan for a counter-offensive in the south, to retake the occupied city of Kherson, remains unfulfilled.
While Ukraine has launched a number of long-range missile strikes into Russian-held territory, the war is now largely centered on artillery-dominated fronts, but it is all but at a standstill.
So far, Western weapons are helping Ukraine defend the front and disrupting Russian supply lines. But if it is to change the tide of the war and get Kyiv to force Russia out completely, it will also take some ground shaking.
Zelensky criticized
So it looks like this military status quo will continue, at an unimaginably high cost to tens of thousands of families.
Moreover, while President Volodymyr Zelensky, widely regarded as a Ukrainian hero, is currently facing criticism for his handling of the Russian attack, especially his decision not to act on U.S. warnings that it would create panic and damage Ukraine’s economy.
Ukrainian unyielding symbol
Olga Rudanko, editor-in-chief of the Kyiv Independent
The newsroom of the Kyiv Independent is another sign of Ukrainian resistance. The English-language news site launched just a few weeks before the Russian invasion, and in just a few days, their audience and followers have grown from tens of thousands to millions.
“It was an Independence Day that we (at the time) had no way of knowing was going to happen,” said its editor-in-chief Olga Rudenko.
She described their publication as the voice of Ukraine, and a window for the world to understand Ukraine.
“Looking back on how uncertain things were in February, we didn’t know if much of Ukraine was going to be invaded, or we were going to be massacred,” she said. “(Today we are) still here and it is very unusual to be able to celebrate (Independence Day).”
The only diplomatic breakthrough
A recent deal to allow Ukraine to export its grain through the Black Sea again is the war’s only diplomatic breakthrough this year.
Some see it as the basis for a final peace deal.
But it is still a long way from peace. Ukraine has lost control of a fifth of its territory.
Ukraine will need help from the outside world for a long time if it is to remain independent.