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Tag: feeling

  • Andriy Shevchenko: ‘I want to share with the world what Ukrainian people are feeling’

    Andriy Shevchenko: ‘I want to share with the world what Ukrainian people are feeling’

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    “It was an incredible, emotional moment for me to spend time with her,” Andriy Shevchenko says as he describes meeting a little Ukrainian girl called Maryna last month. The most famous former footballer from Ukraine, who won the Ballon d’Or in 2004 and the Champions League with Milan before he also coached his country at Euro 2020, pauses as he reflects on a simple encounter where he kicked a football back and forth in hospital with the six-year-old.

    The images of their kickaround assume a grainy resonance when it is explained that Maryna had become the first child in Ukraine to receive a prosthetic limb after her leg was blown off by a Russian missile last year. For many weeks she barely moved. Finally, when she was well enough to sit up, her doctors started the slow process of her rehabilitation by using a football. Maryna learned to balance on her prosthetic leg while using her good foot to kick the ball.

    For Shevchenko, Maryna represents the courageous spirit of Ukraine but he concedes: “It’s very sad to say it like that because she is so young to have been in that condition. But she shows everyone she’s very strong coming back from a terrible injury. It took her some time, especially emotionally, to recover. But she is so brave.”

    The 46-year-old, who won 111 caps for Ukraine, leans forward, his eyes shining with emotion as he describes playing football with Maryna at the Ohmatdyt Children’s Hospital in Kyiv. “I saw her start smiling. The doctor came to me and said: ‘Andriy, she’s been here for four months and we never saw her even smiling.’ Then she gets excited, playing with the ball, and she kicked it back to me with both legs. She was very enthusiastic.

    Andriy Shevchenko with Maryna, the first child in Ukraine to receive a prosthetic limb after her leg was blown off by a Russian missile.
    Andriy Shevchenko with Maryna, the first child in Ukraine to receive a prosthetic limb after her leg was blown off by a Russian missile. Photograph: Andrii Yushchak/UNITED24

    “I saw a lot of kids in the paediatric hospital and many of them were in a very difficult condition. The next day I went to another hospital where I met soldiers, who are really just boys of 18 or 19, and they have no legs, no arms.”

    Shevchenko’s four sons are aged between nine and 18 and, on an otherwise ordinary Wednesday afternoon at his home in London, he nods gently when I ask whether this most recent visit to Ukraine made him think of his own boys. “Of course. But I think it’s good we’re speaking because I want the world to understand the damage. The images of destruction and the bombs coming can be seen on television but the personal feeling after you go inside the hospitals is absolutely different. You feel the pain of people. So I want to share with the world what Ukrainian people are feeling.

    “These young soldiers are defending the frontline, risking their lives, and there are civilian [casualties] too. When you go to Ukraine you always know it can happen to anyone. You accept that. Everyone who moves inside the war zone knows. But it’s more dangerous to be close to the frontline and you see so many families and young children who stayed there. We need to support these people when they have to recover in hospital. But we also need some human relationships with them, to encourage people after such a difficult injury to have a desire to live, to continue life. Most of them, I’m sure, can recover back to normal life – like Maryna.”

    How did Shevchenko try to comfort the young soldiers who had lost limbs in the war? “I just want to give them attention. I walk in, give him a big thank you for his service, for defending Ukraine. It is one of the hardest moments, going to these hospitals, but it becomes a good feeling to say thanks to them from everyone.”

    Shevchenko’s words carry even more weight after the latest wave of bombing across Ukraine. In the early hours of Friday Russia fired more than 20 cruise missiles and two drones at Kyiv and other cities. The haunting sound of air raid sirens echoed around a darkened Kyiv for the first time since early March. There are reports of at least 25 more deaths and of children being rescued from the rubble of their destroyed homes.

    We return to the early hours of 24 February 2022 when the war began. “I remember going to sleep the night before,” Shevchenko says. “I was very nervous but I still believed it would be OK because it’s impossible they start a war with no reason. Until then we believed that Russia would not attack Ukraine. But I did not feel peaceful. I left my phone close to me because I was in London and my mother was in Kyiv.”

    Andriy Shevchenko playing football with children in Borodianka
    Andriy Shevchenko playing football with children in Borodianka. Photograph: Andrii Yushchak/UNITED24

    Shevchenko is briefly silent as the memories flood through him. “It was three in the morning for me,” he continues, “and 5am in Ukraine. I open my eyes because my mum phoned me. I already know what it means. You don’t know for how long we’re going to be in this war but you know something terrible has happened. When the first attack started some important military bases around the airports were hit by missiles. My mum lives pretty close to one of them and she felt that explosion and called me immediately. She was scared and disoriented. She was crying and so I knew. War had started.”

    His mother and sister left Ukraine six weeks later. “My mum didn’t feel well,” he explains, “and so my sister took her and their two dogs across Ukraine, close to the border. When they could they crossed the border and went to Italy. So they are safe but they have been three times back in Ukraine. They go back and forth. We all do. I try to go to Ukraine every month.”

    The family’s close links with Italy are rooted in his successful years with Milan. Shevchenko scored 173 goals in 296 games between 1999 and 2006, reaching two Champions League finals. In 2003 he scored Milan’s winning penalty in a dramatic shootout in the final against Juventus while, two years later, his spot-kick at the same stage was saved by Jerzy Dudek in the Liverpool goal. That missed penalty meant Liverpool won the shootout, having been 3-0 down at half-time of normal time and with their 3-3 draw secured only by Dudek’s incredible double save from Shevchenko in extra time.

    This season has sparked such memories for Shevchenko again and it’s striking that we only stop talking about the war in Ukraine to discuss Milan’s unexpected progress to the semi-finals. Next month they play Internazionale in a Champions League derby which reminds Shevchenko of the 2003 semi-final. He scored the vital away goal against Inter which helped Milan reach the final.

    Andriy Shevchenko scoring for Milan against Internazionale in the 2003 Champions League semi-final
    Andriy Shevchenko scoring for Milan against Internazionale in their 2003 Champions League semi-final. Photograph: Phil Cole/Getty Images

    “They are fantastic memories,” Shevchenko says with a smile, “and Milan have a big chance to repeat the story against Inter again.”

    He is enough of a Milan supporter to believe that they could shock everyone by winning the Champions League – even though Manchester City or Real Madrid would await in the final. “I watched how Milan played those two quarter-final games against Napoli like a mature team,” he says. “I say mature because, when they had to suffer, Milan would close the gap, defend, work as a team, covering a lot of distance and fight. And then they could strike when the chances came. These games are so close but there is a maturity to the team. I think Milan could do it because they have good players and a very strong team spirit.”

    Shevchenko is an astute and intelligent coach, who did excellent work in guiding Ukraine to the quarter-finals of the Covid-delayed Euro 2020, where they lost to England in Rome in the summer of 2021. When he took over as national coach they had just emerged from a miserable tournament at Euro 2016 after losing all three group games and failing to score. Shevchenko drew on everything he had learned from his managerial mentor Valeriy Lobanovskyi, who had helped Dynamo Kyiv become a force in Europe in the 70s and 80s.

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    When Shevchenko played under Lobanovskyi at Dynamo he became intensely serious about football. “He gave me the understanding that there are no trifles in football,” Shevchenko said. “No detail of the work can be ignored. I listened to him with my mouth open, catching every word.”

    Shevchenko’s knowledge deepened during his years in Italy when he was coached by Alberto Zaccheroni and then Carlo Ancelotti, who became his second mentor. The lessons he learned from Italian football shaped his work in revitalising Ukraine. It would have been fascinating to discover how Shevchenko might have done in club management but his brief stint at Genoa lasted just over two months, and nine league games, before he was sacked after a defeat by Milan in January 2022.

    Five weeks later Vladimir Putin declared war on Ukraine and the first bombs rained down on Kyiv. Shevchenko’s determination to help raise awareness of the unjust conflict means that any return to coaching has been delayed. His immersion in the war effort is deep and so there is no time to analyse the current fiasco at Chelsea, where Shevchenko battled with injury and form during an unsuccessful spell from 2006 to 2009. We do not get a chance to discuss how Roman Abramovich, who was once close to Putin, had pursued Shevchenko relentlessly before he signed him from Milan.

    We also don’t have time to reflect on his happier times at Dynamo, where he developed into the lethal striker who lit up European football. I would love to ask Shevchenko about the night in 1997 when, aged just 21, he scored a Champions League hat-trick in the first half for Dynamo against Barcelona at the Camp Nou. The war, instead, is too consuming for such memories.

    “As soon as the war started,” Shevchenko says, “my mum and my sister were packed, with their small luggage, ready to go any time. My aunt also spent 10 days under the shelter, hiding from missiles in the first months of the war. I know families who didn’t even have time to pack or take their passports. They had to [flee] because danger was coming. We did this as a family when I was very young [Shevchenko was nine when his family had to leave their village near Chornobyl and move to Kyiv in 1986] but that was a nuclear disaster. This is a war and if you had asked me a few years ago if this could happen I would say: ‘No.’”

    Has he lost friends in the war? “Yes,” Shevchenko says. “A few close friends. But I know people who have lost much more.”

    Andriy Shevchenko with the president of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskiy
    Andriy Shevchenko with the president of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskiy. Photograph: Alamy

    Amid grief and pain he and Oleksandr Zinchenko, Ukraine’s captain who has been a revelation for Arsenal this season, have set up their Football for Ukraine initiative which aims to raise funds for the war effort. “We already did a lot of different projects together,” he says of Zinchenko and himself. “Now we’re preparing something big with this project to raise support for Ukrainian people. We already did a project in [the war-torn city of] Irpin with UNITED24.”

    President Volodymyr Zelenskiy set up UNITED24 to give people around the world an easy and direct way to support Ukraine’s military efforts, enhance medical aid and help finance the rebuilding of the country. “We raised funds to rebuild the football stadium in Irpin and I think the impact of sport is very important,” Shevchenko says as an ambassador for UNITED24. “It can bring something different to people, and help them escape the war for a little bit. Oleksandr has been incredible. I’m very proud of him because he’s young and he has a very young family, with a baby, but he has given so much support to Ukraine. He’s not only tried to find the funds but he speaks loud about Ukraine. He has stayed so strong.”

    As his former national‑team manager, has Shevchenko helped Zinchenko adjust to the trauma of having to address the war again and again? “When we talk I try to tell him; ‘Don’t hold the emotion. Let it out. There’s nothing to hold. We have to show the truth. We are here to show the world exactly what Ukrainian people are feeling.’ It has been difficult for everyone but, every time we speak, I always remind him: ‘We have to be a lot stronger. We have to help our people in Ukraine because they need us. We have to bring attention to the war.’”

    Does the endless grind, with Russian aggression continuing no matter how heroically the Ukrainian army pushes them back, leave Shevchenko feeling depressed? “I am much stronger now. I know we have to just carry on. At the beginning of the war, and for the first four months there was a lot of hard stuff for me. But I can’t complain because I know on the frontline the soldiers have to face so much and families in Ukraine have to evacuate dangerous areas which have been hit by missiles. We went through an incredible year, the winter was so difficult, and with the first big blackout in Ukraine I was there, in Kyiv.

    “But we defend our country and this gives us such power. We know the entire democratic world is behind us. But this is a good moment for me to remind everyone that the war keeps going.

    “Please help share the Maryna story. These are our people, our children and our soldiers, who are losing their lives or being badly injured. It’s important the entire world keeps helping us. We still have a strong spirit – and that spirit will help us to defend Ukraine and win in the end.”



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    ( With inputs from : www.theguardian.com )

  • In Turkey, women are feeling the worst aftershocks of the earthquake

    In Turkey, women are feeling the worst aftershocks of the earthquake

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    By Willow Kreutzer, University of Iowa and Stephen Bagwell, University of Missouri-St. Louis
    Columbia

    When natural disasters strike, women and girls tend to experience disproportionate challenges and heightened risks.

    They are much more likely than men to experience sexual violence and health problems. Women and girls also face greater professional and educational setbacks.

    So it should come as no surprise that challenges continue to mount for women in Turkey and Syria following a 7.8 magnitude earthquake on February 6, 2023, that killed more than 50,000 people and displaced 3 million people.

    Earthquake survivors in Turkey also include 356,000 pregnant women who, at the end of February 2023, urgently needed medical care, according to the United Nations. Some women have had to give birth to their children in collapsed buildings.

    Women are also more likely than men to be left out of government policies and programs responding to the disaster, often forcing them to migrate away from disaster zones.

    Death rates are higher during disasters for women even in some cases of rich countries, due in part to such factors as women not wanting to leave the home during an emergency.

    We are scholars of human rights and political science. It is important to keep in mind that as natural disasters take a disproportionate toll on women, these crises also tend to shift women’s political attitudes.

    While the disproportionate impact of disasters on women has been well documented, a lesser-known imbalance is how such crises tend to shift political attitudes.

    Research shows that women’s trust in government declines after a natural disaster, while men’s political trust increases in both poor and rich countries.

    In countries like Turkey with multiple disasters a year, studies show that women’s trust in government will likely decline over time.

    This includes their trust in government institutions, as well as their trust in those with power in government – political leaders, parties and parliament.

    When women do not see those in power as meeting their needs and trying to support and protect them, their trust wanes.

    Why women are more vulnerable post-disaster

    There are a few main reasons why women tend to feel the worst effects of a natural disaster.

    First, societal expectations placed on women as the main caretakers in the household in both more and less economically developed countries are exacerbated following a disaster.

    Women are often tasked with collecting and carrying food and water to their families, for example, as well as tending to their children and other family members.
    Women’s responsibilities as the primary caretaker often place them in dangerous settings after disasters, either travelling through rugged terrain to reach water and food or staying in unstable housing structures to cook and help their families.

    Second, governments tend not to prioritize women’s particular health needs. Pregnant or nursing mothers may be unable to receive routine care, leading to an increase in risk of death or disease to both mother and baby.

    While there are some international relief groups and projects that focus on providing menstrual health care to women following a disaster, this kind of response is not common.

    Third, women are more likely to be living in poverty, with fewer economic alternatives than men following a disaster.

    They are slower to return to work, if they can at all, and are often denied government relief under the assumption that their husbands will support them. This further decreases women’s overall safety.

    A series of earthquakes in Turkey

    Following the February 2023 earthquake, advocacy groups and relief response agencies voiced concern that women and girls in Turkey were left in hastily constructed refugee camps that did not have access to safe bathrooms, clean water or period products.

    Women and especially young girls living in temporary shelters are at a higher risk of gender-based violence and early child marriage, according to humanitarian agencies like Plan International.

    This is especially true if women do not have designated areas separate from men as is the case in Turkey.

    The Turkish advocacy group The Women’s Coalition has asked the government to remove preexisting obstacles to supporting women, like ending bans on popular social media sites.

    This is because social media can play a vital role in coordinating relief and rescue efforts, and these bans are actively keeping women and LGBTQ organisations from connecting with people and providing assistance in earthquake-affected areas.

    Women and girls may also be wary of asking male relief workers for help with their reproductive needs. Hesitancy to ask for help from male workers extends beyond reproductive needs.

    Women’s rights activists in Turkey have said that women who were caught naked or without headscarves under the rubble were less likely to ask for help or rescue out of fear.

    Understanding the political ramifications

    People’s trust in the government in Turkey is generally low, and data demonstrates that Turkey could be doing significantly more with its available resources to guarantee respect for human rights overall.

    For example, recent reports by human rights groups indicate that Turkish authorities do not always enforce laws preventing domestic violence, which is common in the country.

    Since people’s trust in politics and government is shaped by lived experiences, we think that solutions to prevent a decline in trust logically involve minimizing the experiences that cause the decline.

    While governments can’t control natural disasters, they can ensure that their responses are more inclusive of women’s needs

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    #Turkey #women #feeling #worst #aftershocks #earthquake

    ( With inputs from www.siasat.com )

  • Biden’s new deficit hawk persona has some progressives feeling some bad deja vu

    Biden’s new deficit hawk persona has some progressives feeling some bad deja vu

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    The growing fixation on the deficit is notable for a White House that championed an expansive economic agenda, including trillions of dollars in emergency deficit spending that, it says, proved critical to fighting the pandemic and revitalizing the economy.

    The rhetorical shift has quietly worried some progressive-minded Democrats who warn it could undermine the case for future crisis aid — or backfire on Biden himself if the U.S. sinks into a recession that results in greater government spending and fewer tax receipts, driving the deficit higher.

    But Biden has leaned enthusiastically into the deficit focus, driven by what advisers described in large part as a political calculation aimed at bolstering his economic record, winning over middle-of-the-road voters, and bludgeoning the GOP over its own deficit-busting policies in the process.

    “There’s a salience to this right now,” said one White House official. “The political argument over deficits and spending is about two competing visions.”

    Part of what’s driving Biden to home in on the deficit are the coming showdowns with the GOP later this year over the debt ceiling and federal budget.

    The president has accused the GOP of demanding spending cuts while backing policies that would add $3 trillion to the national debt. In particular, he’s singled out their plans to roll back taxes on the wealthy and prescription drug reforms projected to ease the deficit. And he’s challenged House Republicans to release their own detailed budget proposal.

    Biden’s deficit focus also serves as a preview of what advisers hope will be a clear line of attack in a potential 2024 rematch against former President Donald Trump. Biden himself has noted that “in the previous administration, America’s deficit went up every year, four years in a row.”

    A White House spokesperson downplayed the recent uptick in deficit rhetoric, calling the issue a longstanding focus for Biden dating back to the Obama administration. And, so far, some progressives are willing to chalk it all up to political gamesmanship.

    “It feels like more of a rhetorical point about the absurdity of Republican policies than an agenda,” said Adam Green, co-founder of the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, summing up the approach as, “We’ll steal your argument and make you look foolish.”

    Still, Biden’s sharper approach toward the deficit of late has troubled other progressives, who fear it signals a surrender of any future willingness to use government support to help in tough economic times.

    They note that most voters don’t vote on deficit concerns, and fear echoes of the Obama administration, when the White House spent precious time and resources making concessions to Republicans in hopes of a deficit reduction deal only to see one never materialize.

    “You obviously worry. There’s a history here,” said Dean Baker, senior economist at the progressive Center for Economic and Policy Research. “I don’t think we’re likely to be there again, but if you did have some serious deficit reduction, we could see it really hitting the economy.”

    Stephanie Kelton, an economist at Stony Brook University who advised Sen. Bernie Sanders’ 2016 presidential run, said Biden’s deficit rhetoric could complicate his defense of ambitious economic spending down the road. The administration’s student debt relief plan, for example, is projected to balloon the deficit by $400 billion over a decade — more than the entire savings created by last year’s Inflation Reduction Act.

    The expiration of Trump-era pandemic relief spending helped drive down the deficit during Biden’s first two years. But much of the major legislation he’s signed since then, including investments in semiconductor manufacturing and infrastructure, are expected to add to the deficit in the coming years.

    In addition, if the U.S. does hit a recession, the slowdown would naturally result in higher spending on government programs and lower tax revenue, driving up the deficit on its own.

    “This is the most anticipated recession in the history of the country, and if it finally happens, I promise you the deficit is going to go much higher on its own,” Kelton said. “Might as well anticipate that and not talk yourself into a situation where you told everybody to evaluate you on your ability to keep bringing the deficit down.”

    The White House has dismissed concerns about the risk of a recession, arguing that all the major indicators show a robust economy. Officials also said the administration draws a distinction between “long-term programmatic spending” that should be paid for, and “emergency spending,” like bills to fight the pandemic and aid Ukraine, that are not. The overarching focus on the issue, they added, is aimed at showing that it’s possible to reduce the deficit while strengthening government programs, rather than gutting them.

    “[Biden] wants to reduce the deficit by having a real conversation about reforming the tax code, by cutting wasteful spending that we make to large corporations,” one White House official said. “He’s not interested in having a deficit reduction conversation that’s about cutting programs Americans really count on.”

    Indeed, despite broader wariness of deficit talk, Biden’s refusal to abandon the remainder of his far-reaching Build Back Better agenda has eased concerns among most Democrats that Biden’s rhetoric is much more than a political tactic.

    Biden is expected to follow through on his State of the Union vow to propose boosting taxes on billionaires, a revenue-raising move that effectively mainstreams an idea long popular in progressive circles. And he’s continued to push for expansive policies like reviving the expanded Child Tax Credit and instituting universal paid leave, even with no path to passing them through a divided Congress.

    He has also stood firm on his pledge not to touch entitlements like Social Security and Medicare, more recently expanding his criticism of Republicans’ budget ideas to include warnings that the party might seek cuts to Obamacare or the Medicaid program.

    White House allies said they expect the president’s forthcoming budget proposal will only serve to reinforce that more substantive vision — and as long as it keeps Republicans on the defensive, they’re happy to have Biden talk about the deficit as much as he wants.

    “This White House is the opposite of chastened from its first two years agenda,” Green said. “They know what’s popular and they want to run on it.”

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    #Bidens #deficit #hawk #persona #progressives #feeling #bad #deja
    ( With inputs from : www.politico.com )

  • Awakening feeling of nationalism will make India powerful: Bhagwat

    Awakening feeling of nationalism will make India powerful: Bhagwat

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    Bareilly: Hailing the Indian family system, RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat on Sunday said the country will become powerful when the feeling of nationalism is awakened in every family and urged Sangh members to work towards ending “casteism, inequality and untouchability” in society.

    He said the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) will take up the cause of environmental protection and called for encouraging people to join the campaign of planting “One tree in the name of the nation”.

    “Till now, the Sangh has been mainly doing the task of nation-building through individual development. The effect of Sangh’s efforts is now visible in various fields,” he said.

    Addressing RSS members and their families, Bhagwat said it is the responsibility of the ‘Sangh Pracharak’ to remove discrimination and create a social environment free from all evils.

    “Casteism, inequality and untouchability have to be removed from society. Social arrogance and inferiority complex both should end. We have to do the work of connecting the society,” he said.

    Bhagwat also stressed the need for adopting native languages, attires, music and food to stay connected to the country’s traditions and culture.

    He said that the Sangh has expanded a lot in the last one hundred years and people of the country were looking towards the organisation with hope.

    “People want to progress by staying connected to their native traditions and culture,” the RSS chief.

    Bhagwat was addressing “Karyakarta Parivar Milan” programme attended by RSS volunteers and their families at the Atal Auditorium of Mahatma Jyotiba Phule Rohailkhand University.

    “The family is the economic, social and cultural unit of the society. The Sangh has been trying to strengthen society and the country by trying to establish better coordination, mutual cooperation and harmony among families through ‘Kutumbh Probodhan’ programmes,” Bhagwat said, adding the Indian family system was the best in the world.

    “The nation will become powerful when the feeling of unity and nationalism is awakened in families,” he said.

    “That’s why it is the effort of the Sangh to empower society by connecting the families of volunteers with the basic concepts of Indian culture. People have to adopt their ‘mool bhasha, veshbhoosha, Bhajan, bhavan, Brahman and bhojan’ (native language, attire, music, architecture, travel destinations and food) to stay connected with their traditions and culture,” he said.

    The Sangh’s image in society is built only by the conduct of the volunteers, he said.

    “The volunteers must sit at least one day a week with their and friends and families and have food and discuss topics related to the nation and cultural heritage,” he said.

    He also said that many social and economic problems will automatically be resolved if there is cooperation between affluent and deprived families.

    The meetings held during Bhagwat’s visit saw special discussions on dealing with the crisis created by the indiscriminate exploitation of natural resources.

    It was decided that environmental protection programmes will be taken up to make the earth and human life safe.

    Bhagwat asked the volunteers to go to every village and serve the people and expand RSS branch in every district from the city to villages.

    He said volunteers would plant saplings in homes and take care of them. He said people should be associated with the ‘One tree in the name of the nation’ campaign.

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    #Awakening #feeling #nationalism #India #powerful #Bhagwat

    ( With inputs from www.siasat.com )