Source: UNHCR

Responses during the winter season have included the following:

Corus International continued to support the work of the Mobile Medical Unit (MMU), operated by the PublicOrganization - Infection Control of Ukraine (ICU) and deployed in remote and conflict-affected areas. In February,

MMU operated in the Sumska Oblast, reaching 786 people with medical assistance, and more than 200 through the provision of psychological consultations. The MMU offers primary, gynecological and ophthalmological care and mental health support services, directly addressing the immediate health needs of the local population. MMU is also involved in public health interventions, such as health education, aiming to mitigate the spread of diseases and improve community health outcomes.

Family Health International (FHI 360) continued to operate 11 mobile teams providing primary and specialized medical care and psychosocial support to communities in Dnipropetrovska, Zaporizka, Kharkivska, Mykolaivska, Odeska, Donetska, and Khersonska oblasts. 

In February, these mobile teams ,601 people with primary healthcare services and over 1009 people with additional consultations by specialist doctors. 2,886 people received individual and group psychological support through mobile teams and  primary healthcare centers.

FHI 360’s Infant and Young Child Feeding (IYCF) counsellors in Kharkivska, Zaporizka, and Dnipropetrovska oblasts provided counseling support to 256 pregnant and postpartum women through individual lactation counseling sessions, and to 175 people through group counseling sessions covering topics such as of breastfeeding, timely introduction of complementary feeding, and proper use of breast milk substitutes. 

FHI 360 donated generators, diapers, medicines and medical supplies to eight health facilities in Dnipropetrovska, Mykolaivska, Donetska, and Khersonska oblasts.

In February 2024, Frida’s volunteer doctors provided 1,792 consultations, with a primary focus on providing specialized care in recently accessible regions within the Sumska, Donetska, and Kyivska oblasts. Among these consultations, 1,267 took place at a boarding school as part of the “Help for Children” initiative. Additionally, as part of the “Frida Academy” project, healthcare workers received four training sessions, further enhancing their ability to offer specialized care. Under the “Mobile Dentistry” project, 113 individuals received dental care, including 61 children.

International Medical Corps (IMC) operated nine medical mobile units supporting access to health care services, reaching 2,578 people in February 2024. 130,062 outpatient consultations were carried out in 84 IMC-supported primary healthcare facilities and 49,812 inpatient consultationwere supported in 27 health facilities in Kyiviska, Chernihivska Sumska, Kharkivska, Dnipropetrovska, Zaporizka, Donetska, Khersonska, and Mykolaivska oblasts.

In February 2024, eight PACT mobile health teams continued activities under the USAID-funded Community Action for HIV Control project in Kyivska, Chernihivska and Zhytomyrska regions. 839 people were provided with medical and psychosocial assistance during this time.

The USAID-funded Community Action for HIV Control project recently organized a Community of Practice (CoP) session for service providers. The focus of this session was to introduce and discuss the launch of a new initiative called the Health Ambassadors Program. As of February 2024, a total of 23 “health ambassadors” have already commenced their work within local communities. Their role involves promoting health awareness, providing education, and supporting community members in their efforts to prevent and manage HIV. The Health Ambassadors Program aims to strengthen community- based responses to HIV control and improve overall health outcomes.

Source: Health Cluster, WHO

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Direct Relief Donates More Than 2,000 Battery Systems to Ukrainian Hospitals Amid Energy Grid Attacks

Direct Relief, a humanitarian aid organization, active in more than 80 countries, with a mission to improve the health and lives of people affected by poverty or emergencies, is launching an expansive initiative to equip hospitals, emergency response hubs, and other key medical sites across Ukraine with backup electricity storage systems. The organization is purchasing and donating more than 2,000 battery systems, which are currently being installed across Ukraine to help ensure the continuation of crucial medical services and safeguard patient care against failures of the power grid.

Attacks on the power grid in the winter of 2022-23 destroyed 61% of Ukraine’s electricity generation capacity and left around 12 million people without power, according to the UNDP.

 The Ukraine Minister of Health announced that Ukrainian medical institutions are now provided with more than 10,000 generators for uninterrupted power supply. They have also begun to equip medical facilities with alternative and environmentally friendly sources of electricity, including solar panels. The initial 300 [electricity] storage systems received from Direct Relief will strengthen medical institutions in 20 regions of Ukraine.

The war has inflicted an estimated $7.5 billion of direct damage on the electrical power sector, and has cost the sector $32 billion in lost revenue, according to the World Bank’s newly published damage and needs assessment.

The World Bank estimates it will cost $40.4 billion to rebuild Ukraine’s power sector over 10 years, using “a build back better approach with policies that align its energy model with the EU energy policy and move toward a decarbonized economy.” Of the $40.4 billion, $1.75 billion has been received.

The donations are also part of Direct Relief’s extensive humanitarian medical aid program to the people of Ukraine since the start of the war in February 2022, the largest aid response in the organization’s 75-year history. Direct Relief has donated and delivered more than 1,900 tons of medical aid, with a wholesale value of $1.1 billion, to support the efforts of health workers and community organizations.

The organization has also provided more than $42 million in financial assistance to groups offering essential health services, including rehabilitation services for war-injured people, psychosocial and mental health services, support of emergency, specialized, and primary care, and support for making health care mobile as people continue to move throughout the country.

Source: Direct Relief

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky indicated that delays in American security assistance have forced Ukraine to cede the battlefield initiative and that these delays continue to threaten Ukraine’s defensive capabilities. The Washington Post published excerpts of an interview with Zelensky on March 29 in which Zelensky stated that Ukraine will not be able to defend its territory without American support, as Ukraine currently relies on air defense systems and missiles, electronic warfare jammers, and 155mm artillery shells from the United States.[1] Zelensky stated that continued materiel shortages will force the Ukrainian military to cede more Ukrainian territory and people “step by step” since a smaller but more stable frontline is preferable to a larger but unstable front that Russian forces could exploit to achieve a breakthrough. Zelensky stated that Ukrainian forces are “trying to find some way not to retreat” from unspecified frontline areas and noted that Ukrainian forces have stabilized the front near Avdiivka, Donetsk Oblast. Zelensky reiterated that the Ukrainian military’s planning ability to make decisions is contingent on US military assistance and that Ukraine cannot plan counteroffensive efforts without knowing whether Ukraine will receive US military assistance, and what future US military assistance will entail.

Zelensky also indicated that Ukraine is conducting rear-area strikes against Russian oil refineries to generate strategic effects as Ukraine cannot plan for or conduct counteroffensive operations without more information about US military assistance. Zelensky stated that Ukrainian strikes against Russian oil refineries and other strategic targets are in response to Russian strikes against Ukrainian energy infrastructure.

Source: ISW

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Explainer: Why is Russia changing its language about the war?

The Kremlin said on Friday that what it has described for more than two years as its "special military operation" in Ukraine had "become a war" because of the involvement of the West.

Here is a look at why Russia is changing its terminology.

IT WAS ALWAYS A WAR, SO WHY CALL IT A 'SPECIAL OPERATION'?

President Vladimir Putin coined the term "special military operation" - the Russian initials are SVO - on Feb. 24, 2022, the day he launched his full-scale invasion of Ukraine. By using that euphemism, he created expectations for an action that would be limited in time and scale and wouldn't impinge on most Russians' normal lives. He also shut down criticism of the invasion and made it a crime to describe the war as a war by signing laws that set long prison terms for "discrediting" the armed forces or spread "false information" about them.

WHAT'S CHANGED IN RUSSIA'S LANGUAGE OVER TIME?

The notion that Russia is not fighting an actual war has become impossible to sustain, given the scale of casualties, the huge increase in defence spending and military production, and the frequency of Ukrainian strikes not only in border areas but deep into Russian territory. Putin has continued to refer to the SVO but has increasingly portrayed the conflict to Russians as an existential struggle akin to that waged by the Soviet Union against Nazi Germany in World War Two. He has accused the West of using Ukraine as a theatre to wage war against Russia by supplying it with weapons, money and intelligence.

SO WHAT IS THE KREMLIN SAYING NOW

Putin's spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, said the SVO had become a war when the West joined on Ukraine's side. He said everyone needed to understand this for the sake of their "internal mobilisation" - a phrase that suggests the Kremlin is demanding a shift in the national mindset to rally the entire country behind the war effort.

WHY NOW, AND WHAT COMES NEXT?

The shift in language follows five days after Putin won a new six-year term in a presidential election from which two candidates who opposed the war were barred. Russia is also now speaking increasingly about the need to seize more Ukrainian land - Putin said this week it may need to create a buffer zone to protect its own territory from attack, and Peskov said Russia must fully "liberate" the four regions of Ukraine that it has claimed as its own but only partly controls. The shift in their language suggests that Putin, encouraged by Russian advances in the past few weeks and delays in the supply of new U.S. aid to Ukraine, has now turned the war into the defining mission of his rule. A key question in the coming months will be whether Putin decides, in addition to the "internal mobilisation" that Peskov called for, to stage an actual mobilisation like the one he ordered in 2022, when 300,000 extra reservists were called up to fight.

Source: Reuters

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New military strategy targets Ukraine’s energy infrastructure

The Russian military likely expanded the target set for Russia’s strike campaign against Ukraine’s critical infrastructure to include hydroelectric power plants. The Ukrainian Air Force reported that Russian forces launched a series of missile and drone strikes at targets in Ukraine on the night of March 28 to 29, Ukrainian state electricity transmission operator Ukrenergo reported that Russian strikes on March 28-29 damaged thermal and hydroelectric power plants in central and western Ukraine, causing electricity shutdowns in Dnipropetrovsk and Kharkiv oblasts.[27] Russian strikes on March 22 significantly damaged Ukraine’s Dnipro Hydroelectric Power Plant (DHPP) in Zaporizhzhia City and the facility will likely remain offline for some time.

Russia’s newly emerging pattern of striking Ukrainian dams and hydroelectric power plans is a significant inflection and an escalation of Russia’s strike campaign against Ukraine. Russian forces did not previously conduct sustained missile strikes against Ukrainian dams and hydroelectric power plans. The US and European countries remain unwilling to provide Ukraine with materiel that could prove operationally or strategically significant and assist significant Ukrainian offensive efforts due to fears of Russian escalation or retaliation. Western states’ decisions to limit Ukraine’s defense capabilities in an effort to manage escalation have failed to prevent Russia from escalating its war against Ukraine, however.

Source: ISW

Source: NATO

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There's a clear trend in NATO members' defense budgets: the closer to Russia, the higher the spending

While several EU countries still fail to meet the NATO target — some spectacularly so — every country bordering Russia or Ukraine (except for Norway) does meet it, according to NATO data. The U.S. and Greece also surpass that 2 percent threshold.

Poland, a front-line state bordering Russia, Ukraine and Russian ally Belarus, has seen the biggest spending leap, jumping from 1.9 percent of GDP in 2014 to 3.9 percent last year. That makes it the top spender per GDP among the 31 countries in NATO.

Source: Politico

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The Polish prime minister, Donald Tusk, says Europe is entering a “prewar” era, cautioning that the continent is not ready and urging European countries to step up defence investment. Tusk’s comments came days after a Russian missile briefly breached Polish airspace during a major attack on Ukraine, prompting Warsaw to put its forces on heightened readiness.

Tusk has been using his platform to try to add a sense of urgency to Europe’s debates about defence and aid to Ukraine, amid fears about the future of American assistance and concerns about defence industrial capacity.

Paris mayor Anne Hidalgo said on Saturday Russian and Belarusian athletes “were not welcome” at the Olympics being staged in the French capital this year, according to Agence France-Presse. “I want to tell Russian and Belarusian athletes that they are not welcome in Paris and to tell Ukrainian athletes and all the Ukrainian people that we support them very strongly,” Hidalgo said in a video posted by Ukrainian YouTube channel, United News. Russian athletes can compete in the Paris Olympics, which run from 26 July until 11 August but only as neutrals.

Source: The Guardian

This project, The Creative Center Kharkiv, in the eastern Ukrainian city of Kharkiv, offers 800 children and an additional 200 parents from socially precarious and economically disadvantaged backgrounds help and support, in coping with everyday life every year and now more important than ever. (courtesy of Caritas Ukraine)