To face the offensive launched by Moscow in Ukraine, new civilians turn to the military training centers opened since the beginning of the war.
With our special correspondents in Odessa, Aabla Jounaïdi and Oriane Verdier
While the war has been going on for almost two months, President Zelensky said that around 2,500 to 3,000 Ukrainian soldiers had been killed since the start of the conflict and some 10,000 injured. In a building that wants to be discreet so as not to be the target of Russian artillery, men and women wield Kalashnikovs.
” In the Russian Armed Forces there are only military soldiers. In the Ukrainian defense system we have a more complex structure. There are the armed forces, the territorial defense and the volunteer military units. This allows us to still have enough people to defend us. Today at the army level we only call people with combat experience. The minimum training time is anyway one month to prepare a soldier, great minimum “Explains retired Colonel Yuri Prokhorchuk, head of this training center.
“I also have to know how to defend myself”
Karina she had never touched a weapon before today. This thirty-year-old hairdresser initially chose another form of commitment: “ At the beginning of the war, I collected and prepared food for the military “.
But today ” it’s not enough anymore, I also have to know how to defend myself “, she testifies, saying to herself “ready to (fight) and (enlist) in the territorial defense of the city if necessary “. ” It’s scary of course but we want to find peace as before. We no longer want to see destroyed buildings, dead people, raped women. We are ready to do a lot to protect our country “, she concludes.
With tears in her eyes, but with a determined gaze, the young woman affirms that today she is ready to kill to defend herself.
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