The first volume of this publication contains stories of girls and women whose lives have been changed by the war forever – military officers, territorial defense fighters, medics, diplomats, human rights activists, volunteers, entrepreneurs, refugees, mothers, sisters, daughters.... These are real-life stories they shared in the framework of interviews or wrote down themselves. Their experiences, their opinions, their fates. We pay tribute to girls and women tortured and murdered by Russian occupants and we are grieving for hundreds of those whose lives were taken as a result of this unjustifiable cruelty, nurtured by imperial ambitions and pride for bloodstained «grandeur».

Over safety concerns we don’t mention surnames of some women and girls upon their request along with selected details as they themselves or their relatives are still staying in the occupied territories. As the warfare is not over we are not able to present the full range of stories from our defenders and medics in military hospitals. Some photos are blurred due to similar reasons. But we do hope that after the end of the war, these stories will be republished in full and help punish war criminals!

The views expressed by women and girls in this publication are their personal views, which are presented without censorship. Their judgments do not necessarily reflect the views of the Friedrich Ebert Foundation or organizations where compilers work.

Compilation «100+ Stories of Women and Girls from Russia’s War against Ukraine». vol_I_ENG.pdf