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Ukraine's first lady is a strong supporter of her nation

2022-03-09T23:16:25.863Z


Olena Zelenska, Ukraine's first lady, published a letter detailing what she described as the "mass murder of Ukrainian civilians."


Ecuadorian father flies to Ukraine to try to rescue his son and wife 3:01

(CNN) --

Olena Zelenska, Ukraine's first lady, released an open letter Tuesday to media outlets around the world, detailing what she described as the "mass murder of Ukrainian civilians."

In recent weeks, Zelenska has repeatedly used social media to highlight her nation's plight, but none have been as direct as her recent post, which ends with the rallying cry: "We will win. For our unity. Unity towards the love for Ukraine. Glory to Ukraine!"

  • Russia - Ukraine War: breaking news, news and the humanitarian crisis due to the invasion

As her husband, President Volodymyr Zelensky, has emerged as the face of Ukraine's defiance of the Russian invasion, Zelenska has become increasingly vociferous online as a means of supporting him and bolstering international awareness of Ukraine's plight. his country.

When Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24, Zelensky stated in a video address that he believed "enemy sabotage groups" had entered Kyiv and that he was their number one target.

His family, he said, was the second target.

Zelensky and Olena met in high school.

The whereabouts of his wife and two children are secret for security reasons.

Nonetheless, Zelenska has been playing an active role on social media, inspiring her people and supporting the resistance to Russian forces, while she garners support from the rest of the world.

On Instagram alone, she has 2.4 million followers.

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The 44-year-old posted the open letter Tuesday on her various social media platforms, as well as on the president's official website, in response to an "overwhelming number of media outlets from around the world" who had requested an interview. with her.

He began the impassioned letter, titled "I testify," recalling the events of February 24.

"Tanks crossed the border with Ukraine, planes entered our airspace, missile launchers surrounded our cities," he wrote.

"Despite assurances from the Kremlin-backed propaganda media calling this a 'special operation,' it is, in fact, the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians."

Before the Russian invasion, Zelenska campaigned on numerous issues, including child nutrition.

Ukraine's first lady highlighted the "terrifying and devastating" child victims, while describing the horror of babies being born in bomb shelters and roads "flooded" with refugees.

According to the website of the Ukrainian Women's Congress, a public platform advocating for gender equality in the government and Ukrainian society in general, Zelenska was born in February 1978 and met her future husband at the Kryvyi Rih Gymnasium high school. №95 in Kryvyi Rih, the southern Ukrainian city where they both grew up.

Her biography on the site says that she later majored in architecture at the Kryvyi Rih Economic Institute and graduated in 2000.

The couple married in 2003 and had a daughter, Oleksandra, a year later.

Their son, Kyrylo, was born in 2013.

Like her husband, who has a law degree, Zelenska moved away from her academic field of interest and into show business.

She helped Zelensky create monologues for the Russian television comedy show KVN, according to the Ukrainian press agency UNIAN, and later became a screenwriter at the television production company Kvartal 95 Studio, which she co-founded.

In a lengthy interview with Vogue Ukraine in 2019, shortly after her husband came to power in a landslide election, Zelenska described herself as a "non-public person" who prefers to stay "behind the scenes".

When her comedian husband first expressed his political ambitions, his wife was not very impressed.

In the Vogue interview, which featured a glamorous photo shoot, she said: "I was not very happy when I realized that those were the plans. I realized how everything would change and what difficulties we would have to face."

  • ANALYSIS |

    Zelensky's heroism collides with Western red lines

He spoke of adjusting to life in the public sphere, but expressed his determination to protect his children, saying, "Let them choose how they want to live."

In the three years since she took office as first lady, she has accompanied her husband on numerous official visits around the world, including to the United States, Japan and France.

Meanwhile, her position has allowed her to focus on numerous issues close to her heart, including "children's health, equal opportunities for all Ukrainians, and cultural diplomacy," she told Vogue.

One of his campaigns has been to improve children's meals at school, carrying out research missions in Latvia, Japan and the US, among other countries.

Needless to say, she is now focused on Ukraine's battle for survival.

Earlier this month, she created a Telegram channel dedicated to providing advice on "how to act and live in times of war."

Hours after posting her open letter, Zelenska, who in 2020 was admitted to hospital with covid-19, updated her Instagram account with a photo of young cancer patients on their way to a safe treatment location in Poland.

She wrote: "These are young cancer patients from Ukraine. Just yesterday, they were hiding from the shelling in the basements of clinics. Now they are crossing the Polish border on the way to find safety and, most importantly, to continue their treatments. No aggressor in the world can stop them from winning the battle against the disease!”

In her open letter, she reiterated her husband's demand for a no-fly zone, adding: "Ukraine is stopping the force that may aggressively enter your cities tomorrow under the pretext of saving civilians."

"If we don't stop Putin, who is threatening to start a nuclear war, there won't be a safe place in the world for any of us."

Zelensky asks for support to decree a no-fly zone in Ukraine 0:39

Russian invasion of Ukraine

Source: cnnespanol

All news articles on 2022-03-09

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