News

Women for Ukraine charity event to mark heroism of Ukrainian women took place in New York with the support of Metinvest’s Saving Lives humanitarian project. The event focused on women from Ukraine and the USA whose leadership and the unbroken spirit help bring the country closer to victory. 

The Ukrainian Institute of America brought together about 120 guests, including women: businesswomen, female scientists, benefactors, journalists, artists as well as female representatives from other professional areas. They shared the true stories of their life and incredible work they are doing in the name of Ukraine’s victory. They also shared stories of other Ukrainian women who are seen as a representation of Ukraine’s fierce resistance to Moscow’s invasion. Each and every story is worth hearing and listening to.

PARTNERS

The event was organised by Firefighters for Peace Foundation (USA) and Bleu et Jaune Consulting (USA), in collaboration with the Ukrainian National Women’s League of America (USA), the Saving Lives humanitarian project (Ukraine), and the Consulate General of Ukraine in New York.

In particular, Saving Lives ambassador in the USA Nelly Ostrovsky shared a story of a hoisting engineer Aliona Farafon who works at Metinvest’s Northern GOK. Over a year of the all-out war, she has learnt to combine her schedule with night shifts and her professional duties with her responsibilities as a mother. She has to do all the household chores and take all the difficult decisions, because her husband joined the Armed Forces and is defending Ukraine in Donetsk Region now.

“More than 30% of Metinvest Group’s employees are women who are blue-collar workers, engineers and managers. Some of them hold key management positions. In this difficult time of war, they show incredible courage. Indeed, our women’s talent to stand up to pressure and overcome challenges can be compared to the properties of steel defined in the dictionary as “hard, resilient and strong”, Nelly Ostrovsky went on to say.

“Once I told Keri-Lynn Wilson [Note: the famous conductor of many leading opera houses and orchestras, founder of the Ukrainian Freedom Orchestra] and her wonderful husband Peter Gelb that when I come to New York I feel that I am sheltered by their family, and I’m not alone who shares this feeling – I feel that the Metropolitan Opera sheltered us all. It was one of the first high-profile establishments that offered a helping hand to Ukrainians in the very first days of the war, and organised wonderful concerts for Ukraine in March 2022,” said the Ambassador, Permanent Representative of Ukraine to the UN Serhii Kyslytsya.

Metinvest has been providing humanitarian assistance to its employees and other Ukrainians since the very first days of the full-scale invasion. Around 500,000 Ukrainians have already benefited from the support provided by the Saving Lives project rolled out by Metinvest in concert with the Rinat Akhmetov Foundation.

FACT 

Saving Lives is one of the largest humanitarian initiatives in Ukraine. Women are in charge of many areas of the project’s operations.

The initiative donates food packages, hygiene items, and medicine as well as implements a programme for prosthetic treatment and psychological rehabilitation. Thus, Saving Lives cooperated with the Masha Fund to provide psychological support to 194 people under the Unbreakable Mom project. Among the beneficiaries are Metinvest employees, their wives and children who have been affected by the war.