Tag Archives: Ukraine

Arts & Humanities, Books & Reading, Current Affairs, Libraries, Politics, Science & Health, Times They Are A-Changing

NLS Shares Ukrainian Books to Aid War Refugees | Library of Congress Blog | Library of Congress

February 8, 2023 by Neely Tucker

This is a guest post by Claire Rojstaczer, a writer-editor in the National Library Service for the Blind and Print Disabled. It recently appeared in slightly different form in the Library’s Gazette.

People fleeing the war in Ukraine in March 2022, crossing into Moldova. Photo: UN Women/Aurel Obreja.

This is a guest post by Claire Rojstaczer, a writer-editor in the National Library Service for the Blind and Print Disabled. It recently appeared in slightly different form in the Library’s Gazette.

Since Russia’s February 2022 invasion of Ukraine, a flood of Ukrainian refugees has washed over Europe. The National Library Service for the Blind and Print Disabled has found a way to help those distant refugees — thanks to an earlier wave of Ukrainian immigrants who settled in Cleveland, Ohio, some one hundred and forty years ago.

“I was attending a … meeting for the [International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions] section for libraries serving people with print disabilities in July when someone brought up the shortage of accessible Ukrainian-language books for refugees,” said Kelsey Corlett-Rivera, an NLS foreign language librarian.

Editor’s Note: Read more, see link below for original item… see video at link…

Source: NLS Shares Ukrainian Books to Aid War Refugees | Library of Congress Blog

Arts & Humanities, Books & Reading, Current Affairs, Libraries, Memories & History, Politics, Religion & Spirit

‘Our mission is crucial’: meet the warrior librarians of Ukraine | Libraries | The Guardian

When Russia invaded Ukraine, a key part of its strategy was to destroy historic libraries in order to eradicate the Ukrainians’ sense of identity. But Putin hadn’t counted on the unbreakable spirit of the country’s librarians

By Stephen Marche, Sun 4 Dec 2022 03.00 EST

Left on the shelf: Russian troops deliberately shelled this library in Chernihiv, northern Ukraine, in April 2022. Photograph: Rex/Shutterstock

The morning that Russian bombs started falling on Kyiv, Oksana Bruy woke up worried about her laptop. Bruy is president of the Ukrainian Library Association and, the night before, she hadn’t quite finished a presentation on the new plans for the Kyiv Polytechnic Library, so she had left her computer open at work. That morning, the street outside her house filled with the gunfire of Ukrainian militias executing Russian agents. Missile strikes drove her into an underground car park with her daughter, Anna, and her cat, Tom. A few days, later she crept back into the huge empty library, 15,000sqft once filled with the quiet murmurings of readers. As she grabbed her laptop, the air raid siren sounded and she rushed to her car.

Source: ‘Our mission is crucial’: meet the warrior librarians of Ukraine | Libraries | The Guardian

Arts & Humanities, Current Affairs, Memories & History, Politics

UNESCO: At least 53 cultural sites in Ukraine are damaged : NPR

By Deepa Shivaram, April 2, 20226:08 PM ET

The Menorah memorial is seen outside of Kharkiv at the Drobitsky Yar Holocaust memorial, a location that saw a mass killing of Jewish people by Nazis during WWII. UNESCO included the memorial in its list of sites that have sustained damaged since Russia invaded Ukraine.
Sergey Bobok/AFP via Getty Images

Since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, UNESCO says it’s verified damage to at least 53 cultural sites in the country.

The organization says it assesses damage reported in the media or by Ukrainian officials and has a system to monitor main Ukrainian sites and monuments via satellite imagery.

“Our experts continue to verify each report, and it is feared that other sites will be added to this list,” a UNESCO spokesperson told NPR.

Source: UNESCO: At least 53 cultural sites in Ukraine are damaged : NPR

Current Affairs, Politics

Olena Zelenska: Ukraine’s first lady emerges as a staunch defender of her nation on social media – CNN

By Lianne Kolirin and Tim Lister, CNN, Updated 9:05 PM ET, Wed March 9, 2022

From article…

(CNN) Olena Zelenska, the first lady of Ukraine, posted an open letter addressed to the world’s media on Tuesday, detailing what she described as the “mass murder of Ukrainian civilians.”

In recent weeks Zelenska has repeatedly used social media to highlight the plight of her nation, yet none have been quite as direct as her recent post, which ends with the rallying cry: “We will win. Because of our unity. Unity towards love for Ukraine. Glory to Ukraine!”

As her husband, President Volodymyr Zelensky, has emerged as the face of Ukrainian defiance of the Russian invasion, Zelenska has become increasingly vociferous online as a means to support him and bolster international awareness of their country’s plight.

When Russia first invaded Ukraine on February 24, Zelensky declared in a video statement 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.

Source: Olena Zelenska: Ukraine’s first lady emerges as a staunch defender of her nation on social media – CNN

Current Affairs, Memories & History, Politics

What to Know About Ukraine’s History – DailyNewsGems

By Bill Lucey, 03/05/2022

Editor’s Note: Bill is an online friend, News Researcher; Writer.

Ukrainians desperately trying to board trains at Kyiv-Pasazhyrskyi Central Station.
Photo Credit: Pete Kiehart/The Guardian/BuzzFeed

Over a week into Russia’s incursion into Ukraine, turmoil and continued bloodshed remains, with residents of Kyiv rushing to the train station to escape Russia’s wrath.

More than one million Ukrainians have been displaced, adding to the humanitarian crisis.

Russian troops, according to a Human Rights Watch report, have fired cluster munitions into at least three residential neighborhoods.

More threatening still, Russia has captured Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, the largest in Europe after shelling the part of the complex on fire, raising fears of a nuclear disaster, others equate it to a “war crime.” For now, the power plant’s six reactors reportedly remain intact and undamaged.

Editor’s Note: Read more, see link below for original item… see video at link…

Source: What to Know About Ukraine’s History – DailyNewsGems

Books & Reading, Current Affairs, Libraries, Memories & History, Politics

The Russian Invasion of Ukraine: Resources at the Library of Congress | Library of Congress Blog

March 3, 2022 by Neely Tucker

This 1648 map is one of the first to use “Ukraine” as the name for the region. Geography and Map Division.

The Russian invasion of Ukraine is the latest violent development in a long and turbulent history in the land of the steppes, and the Library has international resources on the region that go back for hundreds of years.

You can learn a lot here, from one of the first maps that used the name “Ukraine” for the area (in 1648), to the poetry and writings of national hero Taras Shevchenko in the 19th century, to up-to-the-minute news and analysis from the Congressional Research Service.

You can also watch an hourlong seminar, Putin, Ukraine, and What’s Likely to Happen, hosted by the Library’s Kluge Institute and the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, recorded just before Russia invaded.

This article is a brief summary of the Library’s holdings regarding the region.

Shevchenko statue in Washington, D.C. Photo: Carol Highsmith. Prints and Photographs Division.

Some descriptions are from official Library documents.

First, it helps to know that Ukraine roughly translates as “frontier” and its location between Europe and Asia has meant that human beings have traipsed through it, going east or west, for thousands of years. It has been included in any number of empires, divided into many different configurations and called by any number of names before it declared independence in its current boundaries in 1991, after the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Our primary documents thus refer to the region by the name (or names) it was known at the time. The maps, lithographs, books and manuscripts shine through with illuminations and hand-coloring from centuries long past.

Source: The Russian Invasion of Ukraine: Resources at the Library of Congress | Library of Congress Blog