Jinni. Woman At War In Ukraine

Yuliia joined the Kulchytskyi Battalion of the National Guard after being a volunteer for this same battalion, that's why soldiers call her Jinni, as she can make wishes of getting new boots or bulletproof vests come true.

Before volunteering and Maidan, in her early twenties, she was studying to become a policeman. She told Hromadske about her reasons for joining the army, "When you just watch everything on TV and not familiar with the guys, or bring something to them and then go away – that is one thing, but when you begin to socialise with a person, call him and want to hear that everything is OK, and instead of this get a message from his commander that he is not alive – that's completely different".

Yuliia is not the only woman in the battalion, but she says they are ordinary soldiers, "The duties here are not divided into women’s and men’s. If something needs to be done it doesn’t matter who will do it".

// Video by Kira Tolstiakova. Filmed in June.