Speaking from the capital, Kyiv, who was shaken by some of the most mortal attacks of the war last week, and after a visit to the Sumy First Line region – UN representative of the UN women in Ukraine Sabine Freizer gunes described to UN news Nathalie Minard both emotional exhaustion and the resistance he had witnessed.
The interview has been edited for clarity.
UN news: The situation for civilians in cities is drastic, with bombings and sirens of air attacks that sound for days and nights at the same time. Could you describe your personal experience of living in a war zone?
Sabine Freizer Gunes, UN representative of the UN in Ukraine: Living in a war zone like Ukraine is, on the one hand, quite challenging, because as a UN official, we are not allowed to bring our families here. So, one difficulty is living far from the family.
In general, in terms of the war situation and attacks, they tend to happen at night. One of the clear challenges is to be able to spend its week, when you wake you numerous during the night. Sometimes there are attacks against Kyiv several days in a row. Sometimes it is calm for a week or 10 days.
Without knowing when you are going to sleep, if you can sleep a full night, or if you are going to have to wake up three or four times, if you are going to have to go to the shelter, if you are going to have to review the news, I would say that is mentally, that is the most difficult. It is not so much fear, it is not knowing how your night will look.
A resident near the ruins of a residential building in kyiv, observing while emergency equipment looking for survivors after a missile strike in the early hours of August 28.
UN news: you were recently in Sumy, very close to the first line of the east. Many people have abandoned the east for safer places, but others have chosen to stay. How does women and UN couples help them?
Gunes Freizer Sabine: It is quite extraordinary that many Ukrainians stay in their first -line communities. And some of these places have been under attack since 2014. What we see is that people continue to live their lives.
I just returned from Sumy, which is 20 kilometers from the Russian border, and the city is still completely vibrant. Companies continue, coffees, restaurants and shops are still open. People still walk down the street.
This is the situation in Ukraine: from one moment to another, the tragedy can attack.
Life seems quite normal for many hours of the day, but there is always something hidden beyond that. For example, with some of our colleagues, their husbands may be fighting on the first line, their parents or their brothers may have disappeared.
There is always that element that is not visible, but it is behind the reality of the people who are working.
UN women work very closely through local women’s rights organizations. When we have an attack, we ask what kind of assistance we can provide.
Very often, those will be kits that are specifically assembled to meet the needs of women, particularly older women. It is older women who are generally the last to leave their homes.
They insist on staying at home, in their small yards, because they believe it is a much better result than going to live in a collective center.
What we try to do is provide some basic elements so that they can remain in their homes.
One thing I saw yesterday in Sumy, I saw that women’s rights organizations were doing very different types of activities. They are doing cultural activities, activities to support young people, are providing legal advice or psychosocial advice. They are helping women get new skills to start their own businesses.
On the one hand, there is a humanitarian crisis and we need to provide support to save lives, but on the other, in the same city, we are also discussing recovery and development.
UNFPA mobile psychosocial support teams travel through Ukraine, even to the front line, offering immediate emergency interventions, as well as access to long -term assistance.
UN news: Can you share the story of a woman who moved you particularly?
Gunes Freizer Sabine: One thing that really moved me recently was to talk to six women who represented a different NGO.
We were talking about our cooperation and we asked them: “How have we helped you in recent months?” And they said that one thing they really benefited was a retreat that we organized. I thought they were going to say that they benefited from material things we gave them.
Instead, they said that what they benefited was a retreat, which was organized in western Ukraine, which is generally more peaceful. And we gave them five days to be in a quiet space where they could meet, share experiences and where they could sleep. One of them said: “This is the first time in three years that I slept decent.”
That was very powerful to listen to giving space, a sense of normality for our partners can be incredibly powerful.
Listen to the full interview:
UN news: Three and a half years have passed since the large -scale invasion of Russia of Ukraine. What are the most common impacts on the mental health of the women you have found?
Gunes Freizer Sabine: Almost all those who live in Ukraine and who have been living in Ukraine during the last three and a half years have some mental health problems. There is a clear effect of everyone’s mental health war. Regardless of who we are working with in UN women, we always include a mental health component.
In the Ukrainian city of Snihurivka, destroyed by war, an innovative initiative is to train women as tractors drivers, a role traditionally dominated by men.
For example, we are currently training women to be bus drivers, to take positions that used to be occupied by men, but now with men in the front, women must take these jobs.
UN news: Do you see an increase in gender violence (GBV)? What are the specific mental health challenges faced by women survivors of sexual violence related to conflict? And how do you go to them?
Gunes Freizer Sabine: Sexual violence related to conflict is a real challenge in Ukraine. But very often in conflict situations, sexual violence related to conflict (CRSV) is something that is hidden under the carpet.
Here in Ukraine, the government itself has talked about sexual violence related to the conflict and really encouraged those who are survivors to speak openly about it and to seek remedies and repairs.
In Ukraine, the Office of the High Commissioner of Human Rights has documented 484 cases.
But it is expected that it is only the tip of the iceberg, that there are many cases that are not known because today they are occurring in occupied territories, in territories occupied by the Russian Federation, but people also do not yet feel ready to talk about it.
For CRSV in Ukraine, the interesting thing is that there are also many cases against men. So, of those 484 cases, 350 cases are men and 119 cases are women.
This is because the vast majority of these cases are cases that occur in detention. Conflict -related sexual violence survivors need broad psychological support.
UN news: What urgent gaps exist to provide support to women in Ukraine today? How do fund cutters affect your activities?
Gunes Freizer Sabine: Fund cuts have a massive effect on the ability to provide support and services to Ukrainian women and girls. What we consider the most disturbing is the effect of cuts in the rights organizations of Ukrainian women.
The UN women carried out a study in March, approximately one month after the United States declared their cuts. We did a survey of 100 different organizations of women’s rights.
Seventy -three percent reported significant interruptions to its operations due to cuts. Thirty -two percent hoped that they could suspend their operations in the next 6 months. The sixty -seven percent was already forced to say goodbye to the staff. And 50 percent hoped there would be more dismissals.
The most worrying, 60 percent of women’s rights organizations have been forced to reduce or suspend their services of gender violence.
This is directly affecting the lives of women and girls. You imagine that if you were a woman who lived an abusive relationship, you know that there is a refuge in the future, and suddenly you say, that’s fine, this is too much. You go to the shelter, you touch the door and nobody responds because there are no more funds to keep the shelter open.
