Chicago ukraine village

In those first few fraught hours of February 24th, after Russian forces invaded Ukraine, Anastasiia Smyk, CEO and co-founder of aviation software startup Input Soft , recalls being in a state of shock and incredulity. She was in Kyiv at the time, but her 11-strong team was scattered around the country. advertisement advertisement “The first week we were just thinking about how to survive at a human level,” says the 25-year-old entrepreneur. “So we decided to rent a house for our team in the Carpathian mountains, in the [safer] western part of Ukraine, and told them they could go there with their families to wait until we knew more about what was happening. Some of them went. Others were unable to get out.” One of those left behind was the startup’s accountant, whose home town of Kherson, in southern Ukraine, has been under Russian occupation since early March. On May 3rd, when the internet and mobile communications went down, she decided to risk her … [Read more...] about The war in Ukraine hasn’t ended. Here’s how these founders continue to build their businesses

A firefighter extinguishes a burning house hit by Russian Grad rockets in Kyiv’s Shevchenkivsky district, on March 23, 2022, as for the first time, there are signs that Ukrainian forces are going on the offensive, retaking a town near Kyiv and attacking Russian forces in the south of the country. AFP KYIV — Explosions rocked Kyiv Sunday morning, a day after a flurry of missiles struck targets across Ukraine and Russian troops “fully occupied” the key industrial hub of Severodonetsk. AFP journalists reported a residential complex near the centre of Kyiv had been hit, causing a fire and cloud of grey smoke. A colleague living in the complex heard a loud buzz preceding the explosions Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who will address G7 leaders on Monday, said cities as far away as Lviv, near the Polish border, had been struck by a wave of attacks Saturday. “This confirms … that air-defence systems — the modern systems which our partners have — should not be on the sites or … [Read more...] about Explosions rock Kyiv, as Russians ‘fully occupy’ Severodonetsk

Revelers watch a performance in a nightclub during an LGBTQ event as the Kyiv Pride Parade was cancelled due to Russia’s military invasion launched on Ukraine, in Kyiv, on June 25, 2022. AFP WARSAW — Ukrainians were among tens of thousands of LGBTQ activists who took part in the Polish capital’s Pride parade Saturday, in a country hosting tens of thousands of Ukrainians who have fled the Russian invasion. The march however started with a minute of silence for two people killed in a shooting near a gay bar in Norway’s capital Oslo in the early hours of Saturday. Norwegian police have arrested a man suspected of “Islamist terrorism” over the shooting, which also wounded 21 and caused Oslo’s Pride to be called off. But Norway’s ambassador to Poland Anders Eide said love and justice would “prevail”. “Our fight for equal rights for all and our support for the LGBTQ+ community is unequivocal and it will remain so,” he told AFP at the start of the procession. Lenny Emson, … [Read more...] about Polish, Ukrainian activists march for LGBTQ rights

A view shows the river banks at the confluence between the Ticino and Po River at Ponte della Becca, near Linarolo, south of Pavia, on June 17, 2022. AFP ROME — Hydroelectric power in Italy has plunged this year thanks to a drought that has also sparked water restrictions and fears for agriculture, industry sources said Friday. Hydropower facilities, mostly located in the mountains in the country’s north, provide almost one fifth of Italy’s energy demands. But the lack of rain is causing problems, at a time when Rome is desperately trying to wean itself off its dependence on Russian gas due to the war in Ukraine. “From January to May 2022, hydro production fell by about 40 percent compared to the corresponding period in 2021,” a spokesman for Utilitalia, a federation of water companies, told AFP. “Hydro production has been steadily decreasing since July 2021,” he said, blaming “the severe shortage of water even at high levels”. An industry source told AFP that while the … [Read more...] about Drought hits Italy’s hydroelectric plants