Hi everyone, while we’re working hard continuing our mission to deliver life-saving gear to Ukraine’s defenders, we also keep getting requests to still clear up some questions. We hope to do that here as well as clarify some misconceptions and share background information, so that you have more details about the current situation and the way forward:
A. Ukraine Aid Ops will continue making frontline deliveries. There is a rumor going around saying otherwise that is simply not true. Just as Harri always has, we will continue to serve units via both deliveries and warehouse pickups, based on unit needs and location. Nothing is changing with that.
B. As you may have seen in one of our previous posts, we have been partnering with Dlya Heroiv in Dnipro for warehouse management as well as some deliveries. This plan to do this was already made in the Fall of 2022 and agreed upon by all involved members – including Harri – to assist with the hard work of shipment acceptance and sorting and greatly reduce travel time to the front lines. Dlya Heroiv is an independent Ukrainian charity and not to blame for the internal UAO issues. We call on all those who are attacking them to stop.
C. There were some speculations and accusations that somebody from UAO (or even as a coordinated action) hacked into Harri’s e-mail and/or Twitter and shared videos from his account. We looked into these very seriously. It does seem his Twitter was hacked for the purpose of spreading damaging videos and we strongly condemn that action. If we were aware of any of our members being involved, we would not stand for it. We do not believe that any current UAO member is responsible for the Twitter hack and there is no indication that we can find that his email was hacked.
D. We also have to address what we observed over the weekend. UAO volunteers who have faithfully served to provide Harri and the ground team with the gear they delivered were being personally attacked and harassed – in some cases even their children or family members.
None of the UAO volunteers are being paid for their work. Many have even paid for operational expenses out of their own pocket on top of long hours volunteering. Most of our wonderful volunteers are making great personal sacrifices to aid Ukraine’s defense.
While we understand many people were frustrated, resorting to attacking team members or those who have literally put their lives on the line for Ukraine over unsubstantiated rumors is absolutely unacceptable behavior, and totally not in line with the motto OneTeamOneFight.
Thank you for taking the time to read this . We hope we’ve answered some of your questions and concerns, and most importantly that you continue to support Ukraine’s defenders through any organization of your choice. Now let’s get back to work! 💪 🇺🇦
Sincerely,
The UAO Team
Slava Ukraini!
