To kick things off, the company will debut its Blissfeel shoes, which have an upper panel that supports movement and underfoot foam cushioning technology. The shoe will be available in 10 spring-ready shades.
Lululemon will also introduce three other shoes, including Chargefeel for cross-training; Restfeel, a slide-style shoe for post-workout; and Strongfeel, which is an all-around training shoe.
“Footwear is the natural next step for us to expand and apply our long history of innovation in fit, feel and performance, and it represents an exciting moment for our brand,” Lululemon CEO Calvin McDonald said in a statement. “We are entering the footwear category the same way we built our apparel business — with products designed to solve unmet needs, made for women first.”
Lululemon’s chief product officer Sun Choe also shared in a statement that the brand started with women’s shoes first as a result of noticing that they are often designed for men and later adapted for women. “That didn’t sit well with us,” said Choe.
She continued, “Innovating for women is in lululemon’s DNA — now we’re bringing that same expertise to footwear, and women were part of this journey every step of the way.”
While the brand is initially launching for women, there are plans to create a men’s footwear collection in 2023.
Heart frontwoman Ann Wilson has released a second advance single from her forthcoming solo album, Fierce Bliss — a hard-rocking cover of the 1987 Eurythmics hit “Missionary Man.”
Wilson’s version is available now via digital formats. The track features guest guitar from Kenny Wayne Shepherd and additional vocals from a gospel choir, The Rev. Nathan Young Singers.
As previously reported, Fierce Bliss, which you can pre-order now, will be released on April 29. The 11-track collection was recorded at various sessions in Nashville, Seattle, Connecticut and Muscle Shoals, Alabama. The album features mostly new originals co-written by Wilson, while also including covers of Queen‘s “Love of My Life,” Robin Trower‘s “Bridge of Sighs” and the aforementioned “Missionary Man.”
“Love of My Life” features guest vocals by country star and current Eagles touring member Vince Gill.
Wilson recorded two tracks — “Gladiator” and “Angel’s Blues” — with Gov’t Mule, the group led by former Allman Brothers Band singer/guitarist Warren Haynes, who also co-wrote the tunes with Ann. Accompanying her on most tracks is a group of session musicians who now serve as her solo touring band, The Amazing Dawgs.
The first track issued from the record was an original tune titled “Greed.”
Wilson will kick off a series of tour dates with The Amazing Dawgs in support of Fierce Bliss with a May 4 concert in San Francisco.
Meanwhile, the Rock & Roll Hall of Famer has launched a “flyaway sweepstakes” offering a fan and a guest the chance to win a trip to Napa, California, to attend Ann’s May 5 concert at the Uptown Theater. The winner and guest also will receive round-trip airfare to the event and a two-night stay at a local hotel.
(WASHINGTON) — The Pentagon has been providing daily updates on the Russian invasion and Ukraine’s efforts to resist.
Here are highlights of what defense officials told reporters on Wednesday:
Pentagon against rejects sending fighter jets to Ukraine
On Tuesday evening, Pentagon press secretary John Kirby dismissed a surprise offer from Poland to send all of its MiG-29 fighter jets to a U.S. air base in Germany “and place them at the disposal” of the U.S. government.
“The prospect of fighter jets ‘at the disposal of the Government of the United States of America’ departing from a U.S./NATO base in Germany to fly into airspace that is contested with Russia over Ukraine raises serious concerns for the entire NATO alliance,” Kirby said in a statement, adding that “we do not believe Poland’s proposal is a tenable one.”
On Wednesday, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin spoke to his Polish counterpart about the MiG-29 offer, thanking him for Poland’s willingness to help Ukraine, but rejecting the notion of using the U.S. as an intermediary for any aircraft transfer.
“He stressed that we do not support the transfer of additional fighter aircraft to the Ukrainian air force at this time, and therefore have no desire to see them in our custody either,” Kirby said during a press conference at the Pentagon.
Kirby characterized the idea as high risk, low reward — the risk being possible escalation by Russian President Vladimir Putin.
“The intelligence community has assessed the transfer of MiG-29s to Ukraine may be mistaken as escalatory and could result in significant Russian reaction that might increase the prospects of military escalation with NATO,” he said.
In addition to that risk, the U.S. believes other forms of military support are more effective.
“We believe the best way to support Ukrainian defense is by providing them the weapons and the systems that they need most to defeat Russian aggression,” Kirby said. “In particular, anti-armor and air defense.”
The U.S. has sent hundreds of millions of dollars worth of military aid into Ukraine, including anti-tank and anti-aircraft weapons such as the Javelin and Stinger systems.
Earlier on Wednesday, a senior U.S. defense official told reporters Russian anti-air capability now spans much of Ukrainian airspace, which also makes aircraft less viable in the fight against the invaders.
Kirby added that the Ukrainian air force still has several squadrons of “fully mission-capable” aircraft of its own.
“We assess that adding aircraft to the Ukrainian inventory is not likely to significantly change the effectiveness of Ukrainian Air Force relative to Russian capabilities.
While the U.S. has rejected the idea for now, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has continued to call for more aircraft.
“This is about people’s lives. We ask again: make the decision faster. Don’t throw the responsibility — send us the jets,” Zelenskyy said in a Wednesday speech.
And the skies above Ukraine are not yet dominated by Russia.
On Wednesday morning, the U.K. Ministry of Defense tweeted an intelligence update saying “Ukrainian air defenses appear to have enjoyed considerable success against Russia’s modern combat aircraft, probably preventing them from achieving any degree of control of the air.”
“Although Russian air capabilities are significant, their effectiveness has been limited due to Ukrainian … air-defense systems, surface-to-air missiles, and MANPADS,” Kirby said.
Patriot batteries arrive in Poland
Late on Tuesday evening, U.S. European Command confirmed that two Patriot anti-missile systems already in Europe would be moved to Poland. By Wednesday they had arrived, according to the senior U.S. defense official.
“We’re not going to talk about where they are, I’m not going to talk about their operational status, but they are in Poland and they are manned,” the official said.
The Patriot systems are capable of detecting and intercepting incoming ballistic missiles.
Russian missiles and ‘dumb’ munitions
Russia has now fired more than 710 missiles against Ukraine, with about half launched from within Ukraine using mobile platforms, according to the official.
The U.S. has also seen indications Russia is using “dumb” munitions. meaning ordinance that is not precision-guided. The official said it is not clear if these imprecise weapons are being used as part of the original Russian plan or due to problems with their guided missile targeting process.
“What we see manifested is increasing damage to civilian infrastructure and civilian casualties,” the official said.
Russian combat power
Russia has about 90% of its invading combat power still intact, the official said. On Tuesday, the estimate was 95%, but the official emphasized that these numbers are rough estimates, so it doesn’t necessarily mean 5% of Russian forces were taken out of the fight overnight.
No sign Putin preparing reserve forces
The U.S. still sees no indications Putin is trying to gather any more troops in addition to the more than 150,000 originally designated for the invasion, the official said.
Russia’s ground effort
Since Tuesday, Russians have further closed in on Kharkiv, gaining about 12 miles ground.
“It’s still heavy, heavy fighting there,” the official said. “We don’t assess that they’ve taken the city by any means.”
The U.S. has not seen any significant Russian movement toward Kyiv or Chernihiv in the last 24 hours, and there is still no sign of an an immanent amphibious assault on Odessa. Ukrainians have mounted a strong resistance in Mariupol, but Russians continue to surround and bombard the city.
(WASHINGTON) – The Pentagon on Wednesday, for the second day in a row, rejected a plan by Poland to provide Ukraine with its Soviet-era warplanes through U.S. hands, saying the proposal would risk wider war between Russia and NATO.
Poland’s announcement Tuesday, which shocked U.S. officials, peaked hope in Ukraine that President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s calls for more fighter jets would be answered.
But Poland’s proposal essentially punted the responsibility to the U.S. by calling for America to take control of the MiG-29 fighter jets at a U.S. air base in Germany and then provide them to Ukraine — an idea the Pentagon roundly rejected as “not tenable.”
Hours after the White House left the door open to a deal Wednesday, saying “logistical and operational” details were being discussed among the U.S., its NATO allies, and Ukraine, there was another surprise: The Pentagon roundly rejected the idea altogether.
“We do not support the transfer of additional fighter aircraft to the Ukrainian Air Force at this time and, therefore, have no desire to see them in our custody either,” Pentagon spokesperson John Kirby said Wednesday.
The back-and-forth by both NATO allies has sparked confusion and exasperation. Poland originally opposed a transfer while the U.S. backed it — until Poland suddenly proposed doing so through the U.S., which now opposes it.
“This is not pingpong. This is about people’s lives. We ask again — make the decision faster. Don’t throw the responsibility. Send us the jets,” Zelenskyy said in a speech Wednesday.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, recounting what she said was a 45-minute call with Zelenskyy about the U.S. providing lethal aid, said, “He wants the planes, the planes, the planes.”
Russia has warned any country from allowing Ukraine to use its airfields to support military aircraft, with Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov saying Wednesday, “This is an extremely undesirable and potentially dangerous scenario.”
U.S. intelligence has concluded the same thing, according to Kirby, who added that sending Ukraine additional fighter jets is not what Kyiv needs now in its fight against invading Russian forces and their overwhelming bombardment.
“There are alternative options that are much better suited to support the Ukrainian military in their fight against Russia. We will continue to pursue those options,” Kirby told reporters Wednesday.
Ukraine’s air force already has “several squadrons of fully mission capable aircraft,” he added, and the U.S. instead plans to continue providing “the systems that they need most to defeat Russian aggression — in particular, anti-armor and air defense.”
The U.S. has provided Ukraine with Stinger missiles — shoulder-fired anti-aircraft missiles that previous administrations had viewed as too escalatory to provide. The United Kingdom announced Wednesday it would provide its similar system known as Starstreak.
But for now, the U.S. is drawing the line against fighter jets, which U.S. officials say would be logistically difficult to deliver to Ukraine without risking Russian retaliation.
“The intelligence community has assessed the transfer of MiG-29s to Ukraine may be mistaken as escalatory and could result in significant Russian reaction that might increase the prospects of the military escalation with NATO,” Kirby said.
Just days ago, however, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the U.S. had given “a green light” to Poland to provide the planes directly to Ukraine, although he said it was Poland’s choice.
Polish officials opposed the idea, fearing exactly the scenario Kirby laid out — with Russian strikes on Polish airfields. The Polish prime minister’s office even called reports the country would provide warplanes “FAKE NEWS‼️” in a tweet Sunday.
But two days later, Poland stunned the U.S. by saying it would provide over two dozen MiG-29 fighter jets to the U.S. “immediately and free of charge,” sending them to Ramstein Air Base and “at the disposal of the Government of the United States of America.”
“That actually was a surprise move by the Poles,” Victoria Nuland, Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs, told the Senate hours later, adding, “It wasn’t pre-consulted with us.”
Surprise turned to opposition, with the Pentagon calling the plan “not tenable” for the risk it would pose to U.S. service members.
U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin called Polish Minister of National Defense Mariusz Błaszczak Wednesday, thanking him, but expressing outright opposition, per Kirby.
Western countries have significantly escalated their military aid to Ukraine, providing thousands of anti-tank missiles in recent weeks alone, according to a U.S. official.
But warplanes now seem to be a step too far, along with a no-fly zone. U.S. and NATO officials have repeatedly warned their forces will not get involved in the conflict in any way, fearing a Russian attack that could quickly spiral into war between nuclear-armed states.
Calls for a “limited” no-fly zone — over western Ukraine to allow for refugees to exit and aid to enter, or over humanitarian corridors — have fallen flat, too.
“Introducing, in our case, American service members in Ukraine, on Ukrainian territory or soil, or American pilots into Ukrainian airspace, whether on a full or on a limited basis, would almost certainly lead to direct conflict between the United States, between NATO and Russia, and that would expand the conflict. It would prolong it. It would make it much more deadlier than it already is,” Blinken said Wednesday.
To some analysts, a no-fly zone would not be a silver bullet here either, with the Kremlin using long-range artillery, even indiscriminate shelling, to grind Ukrainian forces and civilian targets down. Russia has now launched more than 710 missiles against Ukraine — about half of which have been launched from within Russian territory, according to a senior U.S. defense official.
“The best way to help protect the skies is through anti-air weaponry, which the U.K. is now going to be supplying to Ukraine,” British Foreign Secretary Liz Truss said alongside Blinken at the State Department.
While the Biden administration has said repeatedly it’s consulting with allies and partners on what other military aid to provide, it’s unclear what else it could be. Some 75 percent of a $350 million package approved by Biden late last month has already made it into Ukrainian hands, according to officials.
But beyond individual missiles, the U.S. may be considering anti-missile batteries like the Patriot system. Nuland declined to speak publicly about that option, but told a Senate panel Tuesday there are “other things” on Ukraine’s “list that we think we can do, and I’ll leave it at that.”
ABC News’s Luis Martinez and Matt Seyler contributed to this report from the Pentagon, Sarah Kolinovsky, Molly Nagle, and Justin Gomez from the White House and Benjamin Siegel from Capitol Hill.
(NOTE LANGUAGE) Nicki Minaj recently sat down with rapper and podcast host Joe Budden in an open and transparent interview where she touched on many topics including her and rapper Lil Kim‘s cultural influence.
“The same way I feel I should have already been on the cover of American Vogue, so should Lil Kim, if we being all the way a thousand,” the “Moment 4 Life” rapper said.
“If this is what your magazine represents — influence… Because when myself or Lil Kim goes on the internet, every day we see our influence. We will see our influence,” she said.
In the highly-anticipated interview, the rapper also dished on plans to start her own management company.
Snoop Dogg also spoke candidly in a recent interview. The rapper spoke with Tidal’s Elliot Wilson about his new role as Death Row Records CEO and the 2022 Super Bowl halftime performance, saying he thought the show was the “greatest s*** ever.”
Snoop also mentioned Jay-Z’s role as not only an NFL partner but also a brother in hip-hop who wanted the best for Snoop, Dre and everyone else on stage.
“Jay was the first one that came to the dressing room when I got offstage,” Snoop said. “We love each other. Like, not secretly, like publicly, we love each other. It is what it is, so it’s like for him to go to bat for us and tell the NFL, ‘F*** that. They perform or I quit…'”
Snoop said after the show the two hugged one another and embraced the unforgettable hip-hop moment that had just taken place.
Speaking of unforgettable, the BET show College Hill is set to reboot, according to the Houston Chronicle. Stacey Dash, Lamar Odom and NeNe Leakes are among the cast to star in the reality series.
For $6.25 million, you can be Taylor Swift‘s new neighbor in New York City, the New York Postreports. The apartment next to hers is on the market and, according to the the listing, it offers three bedrooms, and two-and-a-half baths. “At nearly 2,500 square feet, this expansive loft embraces its historical origins with bold steel columns, hardwood floors, dramatic beamed ceilings, exposed brick and 11 massive windows,” the listing teases.
Kelly Clarkson put her contemptuous divorce from ex-husband Brandon Blackstock in the rear-view mirror on Tuesday, and is now thinking about dating again. A source tells Us Weekly, “She’s being set up with friends and is open to dating again.” The Grammy winner filed for divorce in June 2020 after seven years of marriage, sparking a years-long and sometimes nasty court battle.
Ariana Grande has slammed Florida’s Parents Rights in Education bill, which critics have dubbed the “Don’t Say Gay” bill. Taking to her Instagram story Tuesday, she shared a post by Equality Florida that confirmed the bill’s passage in the state senate, commenting, “Really disgusting.” Demi Lovato also spoke out against the bill in their respective IG story.
Justin Bieber had an unexpected guest at his concert Tuesday night — Hilary Duff. The How I Met Your Father star shared video clips of her singing along with her young son to Justin’s “Sorry” and other hits. She captioned the highlight reel, “The. Best. Time. @justinbieber I think this is the last year Luca will put up with this out of me so I sang reaaaaaal loud.”
Shania Twain shared a rare throwback clip of her belting out “Man! I Feel Like a Woman” at London’s Party in the Park concert in 1998. You can catch the entire performance on YouTube. “From 1998 to 2022 — Let’s go girls!!!” she captioned it.
(NOTE LANGUAGE) Making the new Netflix movie Against the Ice was not a posh, fancy experience, says star, producer, and co-writer Nikolaj Coster-Waldau.
In fact, Coster-Waldau tells ABC Audio they shot most of the early 1900s explorer film in Iceland and Greenland, in temperatures of -22 below Fahrenheit, with raging storms that put lives in danger.
“We were in a storm on a glacier in Iceland, where suddenly, they were like, we got to go…the video assist guy was sitting in a van, and suddenly literally rocks were flying through the windows.”
He adds, “The van got smashed up, and that’s when they said, ‘OK, time to get out.'”
Coster-Waldau reveals that he also ended up with a concussion while trying to work out a scene where his character gets into a fight with a polar bear.
“The director…kept asking if it wasn’t possible to do it with a real trained polar bear. And I was like, are you f****** crazy?” he recalls. “So instead, we’ve got this Olympian, this judo heavyweight champion of Iceland, to stand in for the bear. And he was a strong lad. So he was throwing me around and after six, seven takes I had a concussion. I had to leave for the day.”
All the craziness aside, Coster-Waldau says making Against the Ice “was so much fun.”
“It was everything I hoped for. It was as tough as I thought it was going to be and more,” he shares. “From the beginning we were very clear, we wanted to shoot it in the Arctic, we wanted to be on location, we wanted everything to be in camera and we got to do that.”
(NEW YORK) — For the past 24 years, the U.S. and Russia have worked together to construct and maintain the International Space Station, where research has led to some of the most important discoveries of the 21st century.
Now, 227 miles below the unrivaled laboratory, Russia has waged a war in Ukraine that’s pitted the country against the U.S. and its allies — leaving the future of the ISS in question.
“When you’re in space and you’re flying around the Earth at 17,500 miles an hour and in a very hazardous environment, cooperation is the most important thing,” said former astronaut Scott Kelly.
The ISS is divided into two sections: the Russian Orbital Segment operated by Russia and the United States Orbital Segment run by the U.S. American and Russian astronauts were the first to step inside the ISS in 1998.
Watch the full story on “ABCNL Prime” TONIGHT at 9 p.m. ET on ABC.
From there, the partnership has continued. When the U.S. shuttle program ended in 2011, U.S. astronauts like Cady Coleman relied exclusively on Russian rockets to get her on board the station.
Coleman said once on board the craft, where you came from didn’t matter, and it was all about how to work and live with one another.
“Space is hard and space is dangerous. And in my experience … with our Russian partners it means sitting down, having a meal together,” said Coleman. “It means talking about what’s hard for you, what’s hard for them and how together we can get this accomplished. [We] look each other in the eye and realize that we’re all about the same thing.”
Coleman said that American astronauts and Russian cosmonauts would cooperate on everything from life-or-death missions to the mundane.
“I was up there with the three Russian cosmonauts,” said Coleman.”[We] share a goal of exploring space … and that goal doesn’t change whether we’re on the Earth or living up on the space station.”
NASA’s reliance on Russian rockets ended in 2020 when SpaceX debuted its Crew Dragon Capsule, but talks are underway to allow Russians on future SpaceX flights.
Russian cosmonauts continue to train at NASA’s facility in Houston.
Astronaut Mark Vande Hei, who holds the ongoing record for longest space flight, is set to end his 355 days in space in just three weeks. The plan is for him to land in Kazakhstan with two Russian cosmonauts on a Russian spacecraft.
But unprecedented sanctions against Russia could put Vande Hei’s return on hold. After Russia invaded Ukraine nearly two weeks ago, President Joe Biden announced new sanctions, including cutting more than half of Russia’s high-tech imports.
“It’ll degrade their aerospace industry, including their space program,” Biden said during a White House address Feb. 24.
Shortly after the remarks, NASA released a statement on U.S.-Russian civil space cooperation, saying that “no changes are planned” and that the agency will continue to support “ongoing in orbit and ground station operations.”
Dmitry Rogozin, the head of Russia’s Space Agency and a close ally to Russian President Vladimir Putin, responded to Biden in a series of hostile tweets. On Feb. 26, he posted a video in Russian that threatened to leave Vande Hei behind in space and detach Russia’s segment of the space station altogether.
Kelly said he felt compelled to speak up and engaged with Rogozin on Twitter.
“I was just enraged that he, the [cosmonauts], said that they were going to leave an American crew member behind. I never thought I would ever hear anything so outrageous,” said Kelly.
NASA has remained silent on Rogozin’s threats to abandon Vande Hei in space. Prior to the conflict in Ukraine, Russia had announced plans to pull out of the space station as early as 2025.
Although war continues to wage on Earth, Kelly said he hopes that the U.S.-Russian partnership in space can be mended.
“I’ve known [people at the Russian Space Agency], many of them for well over two decades, I trust them. I’ve literally trusted them with my life before,” said Kelly, who added that the U.S. should still “prepare for the worst” and “hope for the best.”
Kelly said the ISS is an example of where peace is possible because all astronauts share a common goal: to explore and learn.
“I just hope people realize and want to keep this partnership together because it is one of the few things that unites all of humanity together,” said Kelly. “I think one of the biggest successes of the International Space Station is the international aspect of giving us something to work on together, that makes us friends.”
A first look at the new live-action adaptation of Pinocchio is finally here.
Disney+ released an image from the new movie — set to premiere on the streaming platform in September — featuring Tom Hanks as Geppetto and Benjamin Evan Ainsworth voicing Pinocchio.
You can check out the photo, showing Hanks as the puppet maker and his creation looking at each other, at the streaming channel’s socialmediasites.
The film, from Hanks’ Oscar-winning Forrest Gump director Robert Zemeckis, is described as a “retelling of the beloved tale of a wooden puppet who embarks on a thrilling adventure to become a real boy.”
Other cast members include Joseph Gordon-Levitt as Jiminy Cricket, Cynthia Erivo as the Blue Fairy, Keegan-Michael Key as “Honest” John, Lorraine Bracco as a new character named Sofia the Seagull, and Luke Evans as The Coachman.
The story of Pinocchio is based on the 1883 Italian children’s novel The Adventures of Pinocchio by Carlo Collodi.
The most famous version is Disney’s 1940 animated classic, although there have been numerous versions over the decades, including one from another Academy Award-winning director, Guillermo del Toro, that will debut this December on Netflix.
(NEW YORK) — When one Ukrainian woman woke up and answered a frantic call from her mother on the morning of Feb. 24 — before the sun had even risen — she heard screams and tears on the other side of the line, telling her what she feared the most.
“My mom called me crying and screaming: ‘Run away right now to the bomb shelter, because the war has been started,'” she said.
The woman looked through her kitchen window and saw half the sky had already been overtaken by dust from explosions in the region. Since that day, when her life shifted drastically, she and other four women have been documenting video diaries of their journeys to safety as they escape the war.
“My country is at war right now,” one woman said. “We forgot what is sleep. We forgot what is food. We forgot what is normal life. We forgot what is work. We forgot what is not to shake with any noise outside. We now know what is death.”
In less than two weeks since the invasion started, more than 2 million Ukrainians have been forced to leave their homes, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, with their lives packed in a few bags on the way to neighboring countries.
Out of the 2 million refugees, approximately 1 million are children — including 8-year-old Eva.
“On Feb. 24, I woke up to the sounds of sirens,” she said. “For five days, I haven’t slept in my bed. My dad does everything to keep me safe. None of this would have happened if the Russian president did not start the war.”
Poland has welcomed the highest number of refugees since Feb. 24, with over 1.2 million Ukrainians having crossed the border, according to the UNHCR. Others have fled to the nearby countries of Hungary, Slovakia, Romania and Moldova.
The agency also reported that almost 100,000 Ukrainian refugees have fled to Russia since the invasion began.
Some, though, have no other choice except to seek shelter as their cities are bombarded with Russian missiles. The sound of explosions, buildings falling and screams of fear have been a constant, they said.
A 19-year-old woman was forced to leave her flat in Kyiv to seek safer shelter amid the Russian shelling.
“Rockets, tanks, gunfire. It’s no longer nightmare. It’s my reality. The reality of all Ukrainians now,” she said. “We are strong nation and we will not give up. I would like to convey to the world we are at war now, and tomorrow, it can be with you. Let’s stop it together.”
Others have decided to join the fight to defend their country.
On the front lines of the war, some women are taking up arms and making Molotov cocktails.
When Russia began its invasion, the Ukraine State Border Guard Service announced that all men between the ages of 18-60 were banned from leaving the country and must instead join the troops.
Women make up close to 15% of Ukraine’s military personnel — over 30,000 soldiers — according to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine.
In one video diary, another woman said she has friends who have taken on the responsibility to defend their country against Russian troops. She said she is afraid of whether she will ever see her friends again.
“We just can’t close eyes and let the authoritative regime do anything they like,” she said.
“I have friends who are 90 years old, 20 years old, and they are now defending Kyiv. No one knows whether they will be alive and that’s horrible,” she said. “I can’t imagine how it can happen in the civilized world when everyone should obey international law.”
As of March 9, the U.N. has verified more than 1,400 civilian casualties in Ukraine, including 516 deaths and 908 injuries, but says the real toll is much higher.
Fear continues to rage as the conflict escalates. The unity among the citizens of Ukraine, however, has been a source of motivation for many, according to one woman.
“We are scared. We’re really scared. But more than we are scared, we are motivated. We are motivated to defend our lands, to defend our country and to defend the ones who we love,” she said. “It is horrible [and] I would never wish for anyone to experience.”
