Ukrainians Celebrate Independence

Dana Malcolm

Staff Writer

#Ukraine, August 26, 2022 – Six months exactly after the start of the Russian invasion, Ukrainians are celebrating their Independence Day regardless.

President Volodymyr Zelensky started the day by offering encouragement to his people via Twitter.

“The history of Ukraine’s independence is quite dramatic and inspiring. The Ukrainian nation was fighting for centuries and continues to do so since Feb 24th. Devotion, bravery, freedom. Our land – our independence.” He said.

Zelensky linked an informational and comedic video explaining how long Ukraine has been fighting to keep its independence.  Despite only declaring official independence in 1991, Ukraine has been around since the early 12th century. Ukraine has had to fend off the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, Polish and early Russian forces.

Ukraine was, like Africa and the Caribbean, divided up between different colonial powers who had the military might to take it, including Russia. While portions of Ukraine were captured by Russia after wars, the country was never truly Russian soil no more than the anglophone Caribbean was British soil .

With the rise of Ukrainian nationalism in the 19th century came uprisings, and in the 20th century Ukrainians began to fight for their independence in multiple skirmishes from 1917 straight to 1991 when they finally broke free and declared themselves a neutral state.

Since then, Russia has been trying to forcefully capture the territory by annexing land in 2014 and with its newest invasion, but the Ukrainian spirit remains unbroken. Celebrations remain low key because of fears that Russia will bomb cities. Instead, the capital Kyiv does what it can, displaying captured tanks of failed Russian invaders as a testament to their resilience.