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As Russias bloody war in Ukraine continues to devastate lives across the country, women in particular are suffering detrimental effects to their mental, physical and sexual and reproductive health.

Millions of women remain displaced, making them extremely vulnerable to trafficking as well as gender-based and sexual violence.

The International Rescue Committee warned last month that abuse against women was rising.

Some expectant mothers give birth without medical assistance in basements and bomb shelters while hospitals are attacked, while basic services have been disrupted to such an extent that the reproductive health of many is in jeopardy.

We spoke to the Ukraine representative for the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), Jaime Nadal, about the continuing risk the conflict poses for women.

Al Jazeera: How many babies have been born since the conflict began and what complications does war bring to pregnancy and childbirth?

Jaime Nadal: In 2022, almost 180,000 women gave birth in Ukraine, many suffering a risk to their lives because of difficulties accessing appropriate healthcare.

Hospitals and civilian infrastructure have been targeted with shelling. A pregnant woman [should] not be wandering around in the middle of shelling to access facilities.

The supply chain for items needed for C-sections and the management of birth and pregnancy complications is also impacted. In the most extreme cases, healthcare professionals have been forced to live in the hospitals they work in, adding significant stress.

We are seeing an increasing number of preterm babies and miscarriages, as well as conditions like eclampsia and hypertension. The nutrition of women is also being compromised by months of displacement and physical exhaustion.

Nadal: The most critical moment in a pregnancy is the delivery and the next 72 hours that follow. Any woman who is unable to follow up with a professional during that time could suffer life-threatening complications.

In the first week of the full-scale war, 84 women gave birth in the Kyiv metro. When women give birth while sheltering from missile attacks underground in metro stations or in basements, they can develop life-threatening conditions such as sepsis that pose a great risk to them and their baby.

Al Jazeera: Do attacks on hospitals especially on maternity units, as seen in the southeastern city of Mariupol in March last year make women scared to seek medical care when they need it?

Nadal: Any attack on civilian infrastructure, including a hospital, is a human rights violation and should never happen. These attacks undermine civilian access to life-saving services.

Many women are hesitant to go to hospitals and in the middle of shelling. It can be extremely risky to attempt to. At the beginning of the war in Chernihiv, to the north of Kyiv, a number of women went to hospitals to give birth and found they couldnt go home again as Russia had occupied their villages.

One woman went to a hospital with her husband to give birth, leaving her other children with their grandparents. Russia occupied her home and she was unable to see or speak to her children for a month. You can imagine the level of anxiety and stress that causes.

There has been a rise in sexual and gender-based violence in Ukraine since the start of the war, as well as an increase in domestic violence.

Al Jazeera: How can women be protected?

Nadal: The invasion displaced millions of people, many of them women and children. When you have so many people at that level of vulnerability, the risk of gender-based violence, sexual violence, trafficking and exploitation is high.

Our priority was to quickly re-establish services such as shelters and mobile clinics, and to make sure women know they can access psychosocial support and hygiene kits to preserve their dignity.

We first started seeing cases of sexual violence after the liberation of Bucha and Irpin. None of the survivors had reported the cases to law enforcement, and most wanted help to test for STIs [sexually transmitted infections] or pregnancy.

It takes a lot of work from psychologists to get them to open up and identify as survivors, and the trauma will take a long time to heal.

Before the war, we developed an initiative that provides space for men in the Ukrainian military to engage meaningfully with their children and wives. The first hubs were in the east from 2014. We provide men with psychosocial support that steers them away from toxic masculinity. This helps them process trauma, which can manifest in violence, abuse or alcohol misuse.

Al Jazeera: What are the latest figures on the scale of sexual violence in Ukraine?

Nadal: Its hard to rely on numbers, as they dont give an accurate reflection of the problem. Many survivors are reluctant to disclose what happened due to trauma, stigma and self-blame.

Out of the cases recorded by OHCHR, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, two-thirds are women and one-third are men, many of them former prisoners of war. The number of cases reported is probably the tip of the iceberg.

In our Dnipro centre, staff told me that for every 100 women they have seen, maybe 10 have suffered gender-based violence and one sexual violence. Sometimes people try to pretend it didnt happen or try to live with it and dont seek help.

We need to ensure that survivors know they are not alone, the situation matters and that the UN and the Ukrainian government are working to provide them with the best care possible. Our mobile teams have provided general support to over 17,000 women so far, and our relief centres almost 10,000. The more services we put in place the more survivors will seek help.

Al Jazeera: The situation is very different for people in the west of the country compared to the east. How does that affect the provision of support for women?

Nadal: Were very worried about the protracted nature of this crisis now. There has been a huge movement of women from the east and south to central and western Ukraine and abroad.

The harsh conditions of displacement increase the complexity of womens needs.

The lack of available work and income poses a huge challenge to the wellbeing of women and their families, as well as the difficulty in accessing healthcare in some places. What were seeing is that the situation is worse in 2023 and we are constantly trying to keep up with new developments.

We have repeatedly requested access to occupied territories, but have not been granted it. In the east of the country, were very concerned about the situation of older women. Some dont want to leave their homes behind and are living close to the front line of the conflict with serious health conditions, such as uterine prolapse.

Al Jazeera: With hospitals shelled, where are these women supposed to go if they experience something like this?

Nadal: There are some mobile clinics run by the government that we support that go to communities to help, especially for those with mobility issues or disability, and for areas where there is no public transport.

War comes with suffering, pain, stress and anxiety. The extension of this war is prolonging the distress of millions of women.

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Russias war in Ukraine exacts heavy toll on women, says UNFPA - Al Jazeera English

If eastern town falls to Russian forces, Putin would sell this victory to the West, to his society, to China, to Iran, Ukraine leader Zelenskyy says.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy warned unless his country wins a months-long battle in the eastern city of Bakhmut, Russia may begin building international support for a peace deal that could require Ukraine to make unacceptable compromises.

He also invited the leader of China, long aligned with Russia, to visit Ukraine.

If Bakhmut falls to Russian forces, President Vladimir Putin would sell this victory to the West, to his society, to China, to Iran, Zelenskyy said.

If he will feel some blood smell that we are weak he will push, push, push, Zelenskyy told The Associated Press on Tuesday.

The president said he worries the war could be impacted by shifting political forces in Washington.The United States really understands that if they stop helping us, we will not win.

Zelenskyy also extended an invitation to Chinese President Xi Jinping.

We are ready to see him here. I want to speak with him. I had contact with him before full-scale war. But during all this year, more than one year, I didnt have, he said.

China, economically aligned and politically favourable towards Russia for decades, has provided Putin diplomatic cover by staking out an official position of neutrality in the war.

Xi visited Putin in Russia last week, raising the prospect Beijing might be ready to provide Moscow with the weapons and ammunition it needs to refill its depleted stockpile. But Xis trip ended without any such announcement.

Days later, Putin announced he would deploy tactical nuclear weapons to Belarus, which neighbours Russia and pushes the Kremlins nuclear stockpile closer to NATO territory.

Zelenskyy suggested Putins move was intended to distract from the lack of guarantees he received from China.What does it mean? It means that the visit was not good for Russia.

Zelenskyy recently made a visit near Bakhmut where Ukrainian and Russian forces have been locked for months in a grinding, bloody battle.

While some Western military analysts have suggested the city is not of significant strategic importance, Zelenskyy warned a loss anywhere at this stage in the conflict could put Ukraines hard-fought momentum at risk.

We cant lose the steps because the war is a pie pieces of victories. Small victories, small steps, he said.

Zelenskyys comments were an acknowledgement that losing the seven-month-long battle for Bakhmut the longest of the war so far would be more of a costly political defeat than a tactical one.

He predicted the pressure from a defeat in Bakhmut would come quickly both from the international community and within his own country. Our society will feel tired. Our society will push me to compromise with them.

Zelenskyy made few predictions about the biggest question hanging over the war: How it will end?

He expressed confidence, however, Ukraine will prevail through a series of small victories and small steps against a very big country, big enemy, big army but an army, he said, with small hearts.

See more here:
Capture of Bakhmut means Putin will smell weakness: Ukraine - Al Jazeera English

In early October 2022, Rachel Clarke hurried into Kyivs bomb shelters with hundreds of Ukrainians. The UK-based National Health Service (NHS) doctor and author was visiting Ukraine to provide support and training to doctors caring for the dying at hospices around the country. However, the visit to the capital came just as Russia was bombarding the citys power infrastructure with missiles.

You didnt just hear the missiles landing, you felt that they reverberated in your chest, Clarke explained atWIRED Health in London this March. Above ground, windows were blown out. Shattered glass lined the streets. I was terrified, Clarke says. The Ukrainian people have endured this for months.

Since Russias full-scale invasion started in February 2022, the whole of life inUkraine has been impacted,including its health care system. Hospitals have been destroyed and damaged, medical facilities have been looted, and landmines have been found inside functioning Ukrainian hospitals that Russian forces had briefly occupied,according to the charity Mdecins Sans Frontires. Those who lived in occupied areas had essential medicines and treatments restricted, the charity says.

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Throughout the war, millions of people have been displaced from eastern Ukraine, and the continued fighting has been putting further strain on the countrys medical infrastructure at all levels. Surgeons operating on patients have learned tocontinue with procedures when air raid sirens start, Clarke says. Ambulances carrying people have been dug out of mud and snow after getting stuck.

Among the widespread disruption, the war has curbed the care that can be provided to those who are terminally illincluding soldiers wounded on the front lines. Clarke, a palliative care doctor within the NHS, says patients and those who care for them need more support. One hospice she visited, a three-story building that cares for up to 30 patients, couldnt afford a lift, so those whocouldnt make it down the stairs were stuck inside. Similar scenes are repeated across the countrys hospices. One patient who is living with a terminal lung condition and cannot afford to donate to the hospice has been knitting socks for the doctors and nurses caring for her, Clarke says.

Greater supplies of morphine and pressure-relieving mattresses are two low-tech interventions that could help support people, she says. Clarke and neurosurgeon Henry Marsh have now set up a new charity,Hospice Ukraine, to provide further training for staff and fund further supplies. It will work with trusted local partners to improve care, Clarke says. The aim is to help provide some relief for those dealing with the deadly consequences of war. Health care in Ukraine is being deliberately targeted as a weapon of war, Clarkesaid as the charity launched. If you maim a doctor, you are also harming all the other people that doctor might have treated.

Excerpt from:
Russia Is Waging War on Ukraines Hospitals - WIRED

WARSAW, March 31 (Reuters) - Tariffs on Ukrainian agricultural imports may need to be reintroduced if an influx of products that is pushing down prices in European Union markets cannot be stopped by other means, the prime ministers of five eastern states said on Friday.

In a letter to European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen published on a Polish government website, the prime ministers of Poland, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria and Slovakia said that the scale of the increase of products including grains oilseeds, eggs, poultry and sugar had been "unprecedented".

Ukraine, one of the world's largest grain exporters, had its Black Sea ports blocked following Russia's February 2022 invasion and found alternative shipping routes through European Union states Poland and Romania.

Logistical bottlenecks mean large quantities of Ukrainian grains, which are cheaper than those produced in the EU, have ended up in central European states, hitting prices and sales of local farmers.

In the letter the prime ministers called for a variety of measures to limit market distortions caused by Ukrainian imports, but said that if these were not successful tariffs and tariff quotas should be reintroduced.

"Let's support Ukraine, but let's do it wisely and, above all, let's put the interest of the country and Polish farmers in the first place," Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said on Twitter.

Among the measures proposed in the letter was a joint solution between the EU and the World Food Program to ensure Ukrainian grain does not end up in EU markets.

They reiterated calls for more funds to help farmers and for faster development of transport infrastructure to help with the transport of goods from Ukraine.

They also called for changes to laws on agricultural imports that would help regulate the volume and direction of the inflow of agricultural products.

Reporting by Alan Charlish, Anna Wlodarczak-Semczuk; editing by Jonathan Oatis

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

The rest is here:
EU may need to reintroduce tariffs on Ukrainian grain, PMs say - Reuters.com

29 March 2023

Hundreds of worshippers attended a service at the monastery on Wednesday

Orthodox Christian clerics say they will stay at a historic monastery in the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, despite a planned government-ordered eviction of hundreds of priests, monks and students.

The Pechersk Lavra is a seat of Ukraine's Orthodox Church (UOC), which split from the Moscow patriarchate after Russia's invasion last year.

But Ukrainian officials suspect some of the top clergy have maintained ties with the Church in Moscow, which they deny.

The UOC has been ordered to leave the site by the end of Wednesday.

The Ukrainian government, which owns the vast 11th Century monastery overlooking the Dnipro river, says the decision was taken after a commission discovered multiple violations of the tenancy agreement of the complex, a Unesco World Heritage Site.

Metropolitan Clement, head of the UOC press office, said there were "no legal grounds" for the expulsion, announced earlier this month.

"If the government forces us to do it illegally, it's called totalitarianism," he told the BBC. "We don't need such a state or government. We have the constitution and laws. We don't accept other methods."

The issue is also highly political. Ukrainian authorities accuse some UOC members of covertly supporting Moscow during the war, although some leaders have denounced the Russian invasion.

Last year, Ukraine's security service carried out a raid of the Lavra and other buildings belonging to the UOC, and dozens of clerics have been arrested on accusations of treason and collaboration with Russia. The UOC, however, says there is no evidence to support the charges.

On top of that, last year a criminal inquiry was opened after a video emerged of pro-Russian propaganda being sung, referring to the awakening of Mother Russia, while the head of a diocese in the Vinnytsia area of central Ukraine was charged with preparing leaflets supporting the invasion.

On Wednesday morning, hundreds of worshippers gathered outside the complex under a light snowfall to attend Mass. Like in recent days, police were inspecting cars entering and leaving the site, but the situation remained calm.

The expulsion has exposed divisions among the Ukrainian Orthodox community. In recent years, many have joined the independent Orthodox Church of Ukraine, which was granted independence in 2019, while millions still follow the UOC, which split from Moscow last May after centuries under its control.

Lubov Bank, a 60-year-old choir singer from the central city of Poltava, said she had been demonstrating at the Lavra for three days, and called the decision to expel the monastery's residents a "political decision". "They [the government] don't follow the constitution," she said. "Monks are real angels. I don't want the authorities to do this."

It is not clear what will happen if the UOC does not leave the complex, but the Ukrainian culture minister, Oleksandr Tkachenko, said the authorities would not use force to expel the monks.

The Russian Orthodox Church has echoed the rhetoric of the Kremlin in justifying the war in Ukraine. Its head, Patriarch Kirill, has suggested in sermons that Russia's war is a righteous one about the future of Christianity and failed to unequivocally condemn the killing of innocent people in Ukraine.

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Watch: A virtual journey through Ukraines bombed cities

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Ukraine war: Orthodox clerics say they will not leave Kyiv monastery - BBC