Most of the
headlines you see
on the war in Ukraine are about a battle
for a particular town.
An additional aid package
from a Western country
or another round of missile strikes.
Those are all important,
but they miss the humanity.
The fact
there are human beings
living in those towns,
receiving that aid,
being killed by those missile strikes
There are people with names
and faces,
mothers and fathers, sons
and daughters, brothers and sisters.
I can think of
no one better to talk
about the human impact
of this horrible war
than the first lady of Ukraine.
Olena Zelensky.
She joins me now exclusively from Kiev.
Madam First Lady, welcome that freedom.
Hello.
It is great to see you on the screen.
When we first met in Kiev many years ago,
it it did not seem that you would
be, in a sense, a kind of wartime
first lady.
How much has
your life changed with this war?
Are you
are you able to function in any way
normally
excluded?
But that's a tough question.
The very issue of normality is a global
philosophical question.
It depends
on your definition of normality,
because our life cannot be considered
as normal today.
Even if you compare to what
we had a year ago
and what we have today in Ukraine
and the first months, we were shocked.
We could not believe
that such and aggression is possible.
It is absolutely illogical
and it was inconceivable
that it can happen
in the center of Europe.
Now people are trying to go
on living, working,
having their children go to school.
Sometimes they even make jokes
and not only
are they trying to survive,
but to live a meaningful life.
All people in Ukraine
are subject from time to time to
Russia's missile attacks.
Now, she did the US.
It is now
all glued together, equally drawn.
People can now tell
between the sound of a drowned
in this fight
and the enemy's missile is not this.
Our children have grown up to sitting
and
you can see a lot of young children.
Whose eyes are those of the adults.
And it worries me immensely.
But in spite of everything,
we are trying to be optimistic
among some progress towards.
People are getting adjusted
to the new conditions and today
people have got accustomed
to those electricity costs and they find
new opportunities then that and when
at three I am
electricity appears been alive in margins
and real and people are told
they are washing machines and
they are pumping machines
and there are a lot
of people
who have learned how to cook with
no electricity
even having electric cookers.
So this huge impact
that the war has had on us
also has taught us a lot
and we are trying to preserve
some sort of normality today.
When you look at the way
the Russians have waged this war
in places
like Mariupol,
where there are some estimates
that one out of every four
residents of that city were killed.
When you look at the bombing
of civilian areas,
the bombing of power plants to
to make people
lose access to heat and electricity,
it seems that it is an effort to break
the will of the civilian population.
And it takes us back to really kind
of world war two days
Is it
do you worry
that it could succeed, that
this the just the sheer devastation
of the Russian assault
could break the back of in
some of these cities,
in some of these communities,
Desperation.
In the neighborhoods. It's a little bit.
Yeah, of course,
that's exactly what they are
trying to do.
I don't think they will succeed
And we understand that
upon carrying on for a year,
we are capable of persevering
for the longer we can endure it.
But you are right.
And that therefore fight terrorism
aims to intimidate people.
Quite recently, if three days ago
there was yet
another shelling of a civilian community
and the projectile fight an open
air market
with a lot of people and air toys
a sheer act of terrorism
that cannot be over
explained or justified.
And one of the purposes that they have is
to destroy the
infrastructure of this country
for people
to be exhausted,
for people to raise their voice and say,
oh, we are sick and tired of this war.
Let us negotiate letters,
raise this war to the end,
but they will to end this purpose.
With so many men fighting now
or supporting the war effort in some way,
A lot of Ukrainian women have stepped up
and taken roles
that perhaps they would not have taken
before the war.
Tell us a little bit about what
you have seen
about the women of Ukraine
and how they have responded to this war.
Darkness,
you know, of you know,
women have taken the brunt of
it more in terms
of ensuring that their families
out of
their children are
that their children are mothers.
And grandmothers have stepped in
to prevent them.
Several millions of our women
and children
have fled from the war and fraud there.
And a lot of
internally displaced
people, more than 5 million
Ukrainians have fled their homes.
And now
reside in all regions of the speakers.
Very unusual.
It is not normal.
And people have to endure exactly what
when you see
the Kremlin
with the national conscripts, the nurses,
because I would not actually single out
women as a part of a popular mission.
They do what is needed.
So we protect each other.
We support each other.
And we hope that most
of the families will
be able to reunite.
I would
not be alone
if I say that
more than half of all families
are divided us separated.
Some of the Russian families were
members of
the families are in occupation,
whereas all those relatives are
in the of three area of Ukraine
and they have no way of knowing
what happened
to those under the occupation
and they are not sure whether
their relatives are still alive
and they are
full of hope that they are all I
have been
defined this expectations that this whole
you've talked
Madam First Lady about
the special needs of children
in this situation.
And I was wondering,
you have little children yourself.
How have they dealt with this?
What have you told them
that when the the war started,
they didn't see their father for months
even now.
Do they understand it?
Have they have
they had to grow up very fast?
Isn't that the
seed you think
Ukrainian does it need to be,
you know, all children in Ukraine
understand what's going on,
including mine?
You cannot feel anything from the NPA
trying to do so
because they live in the same information
base as all of us in our town believe.
That trying to call someone
not a normal life
want them, want children
be and so because
COVID is a part of their life,
that's what keeps your life together.
This is something that does not allow you
to get desperate again.
I'm close with the committee in the
so you've spoken, but
I try to coddle my children
to them to reassure them.
But my the children
should live in a well organized,
well structured life.
And I'm trying to bring in this order and
play and
understand that coordination.
Sooner or later, everyone
stops thinking that they do not know
what's going on
and what will happen tomorrow
and whether they should put
a lot of effort
in to say, university studies
at school.
But we should not be
this solution.
We should not speak up
because we know that Ukraine
after the war, what else needs educated
young people
that would be restoring our country
and restoring normality
and the country and in time.