The war in Ukraine is keeping us busy almost around the clock. We are experiencing unprecedented solidarity and support for our humanitarian aid. With numerous donations comes a lot of responsibility. On this page we therefore continuously show which projects we have already been implemented with your help (as of 15 November 2022).
Thanks to numerous private donations and the kind support of many companies and organisations, we were able to massively increase our humanitarian work in Ukraine after 24 February. In total, we have been active in 12 of Ukraine’s 27 regions since the start of the Russia’s large-scale attack.
While we greatly expanded our activities in most regions after the invasion, we had to suspend all activities in Luhansk oblast this summer after the entire oblast was occupied by Russian troops. We had been active in the easternmost Ukrainian region since 2015.
Direct support for Vostok SOS
Amount: 577,500 Euro
Description: Since 2015, Vostok SOS has been involved in humanitarian aid in Ukraine. Our long term partner organisation has set up telephone hotlines and online contact forms where affected people can request assistance. Vostok SOS helps people evacuate from embattled places and find temporary housing within Ukraine. Staff and volunteers provide IDPs and people in particularly affected areas with medicine, dressing material, hygiene products and food. Trucks, vans and trains are used to transport aid from western Ukraine to other parts of the country and especially to places that are not supplied by other aid organisations because they are too small, too inaccessible or too dangerous to reach.
More information: New York Times, Reuters, ZDF, Arte, NZZ, Kyiv Independent
Packing action: Humanitarian aid campaign for Ukraine
Amount: 282,000 Euro
Description: As part of the Germany- and Switzerland-wide campaign, we organize practical help that directly reaches those in need and provides them with essential food and hygiene items. Libereco coordinates and organizes the packing campaign in several cities, takes care of the logistics, mobilizes volunteers and transports the aid supplies to Ukraine. There they are transported and distributed by Vostok SOS. Packing events have already taken place in Dortmund, Berlin, Munich and Zurich.
More information: Libereco, Libereco, Libereco, BVB, BVB, Abendzeitung
Medical aid for Ukrainian hospitals
Amount: 250,000 Euro
Description: In close cooperation with the football club Borussia Dortmund, the Klinikum Dortmund and the medical aid organization German Doctors, Libereco organizes the transport of medical aid, which is delivered directly to the Ministry of Health in Ukraine. So far, two deliveries of medicines have taken place, with more to follow.
More information: Ruhr Nachrichten, bvb.de, kmu.gov.ua
Purchase and maintenance of buses for evacuations from eastern Ukraine
Amount: 90,000 Euro
Description: Postbus Switzerland has already donated five decommissioned but still fully roadworthy buses. Additionally, Post Company Cars provided a vehicle that our partner Help People converted for evacuations, especially for bedridden people.
In May, Postbus drivers Florian and Laurent brought two vehicles to Ukraine with great personal commitment. The buses were loaded with 70 donated mattresses from Arena Resort Altein and dozens of sleeping bags from private donors. Another vehicle was brought to Ukraine in August 2022 with support from Licht im Osten. Three more transfers were carried out in September and October 2022. Our partners Help People and Vostok SOS use the buses to transport people and evacuate people from war-affected places in eastern Ukraine.
More information: HelpPeople I, HelpPeople II
Fuel costs to support evacuations in eastern Ukraine
Amount: 75,000 Euro
Description: Libereco supports several local Ukrainian organisations and initiatives, including HelpPeople (former name “За покликом серця”, in German “Dem Ruf des Herzens folgen”) and Help Kharkiv. These carry out evacuations from particularly embattled cities such as Kharkiv, Chernihiv, Kyiv as well as the Donbas region to western Ukraine.
Further information: Help Kharkiv
Set-up of emergency shelters for internally displaced persons in Ivano-Frankivsk
Amount: 50,000 Euro
Description: Vostok SOS uses the donations to renovate facilities in the western Ukrainian city of Ivano-Frankivsk. The facilities will also be equipped with medical equipment so that not only IDPs can be housed there, but also receive medical and psychological treatment.
Establishing a center for documenting human rights violations and providing psychosocial support to internally displaced persons in Dnipro
Amount: 50,000 Euro
Description: Dnipro, Ukraine’s fourth largest city, is currently the first destination for many people fleeing the war zones of eastern and southern Ukraine and Russian troops. We support Vostok SOS in renting, renovating and equipping rooms that are used to document human rights violations and war crimes as well as to provide psychosocial support for internally displaced persons. Donations are also used to fund the documentation of human rights violations and war crimes in the occupied areas and war zones, as well as psychosocial support for the refugees themselves.
Two vans and medical supplies
Amount: 46,400 Euro and two vans donated in kind worth several thousand Swiss francs
Description: Post Company Cars, a Swiss Post company, has donated two vans worth several thousand Swiss francs to Libereco. Filled to the brim with medical supplies, we brought both vehicles to Uzhhorod. Vostok SOS is using both vehicles in Ukraine to distribute urgently needed relief supplies.
More information: Libereco
Large delivery of nappies
Amount: 45,000 Euro
Description: Libereco purchased a total of 4,104 packs of nappies of various sizes and over 4,000 packs of wet wipes in Germany and transported them to Ukraine. There, the hygiene products will be distributed especially to parents who fled with their children from the war to other parts of the country.
PostBuses for evacuations from Eastern Ukraine
Amount: donations in kind worth tens of thousands of Swiss francs
Description: Postbus Switzerland has already donated five decommissioned but still fully roadworthy buses. In May, Postbus drivers Florian and Laurent brought two vehicles to Ukraine with great personal commitment. The buses were loaded with 70 donated mattresses from Arena Resort Altein and dozens of sleeping bags from private donors. Another vehicle was brought to Ukraine in August 2022 with support from Light in the East. Two more transfers are scheduled for September and October 2022. Our partners Help People and Vostok SOS use the buses to transport people and evacuate people from war-affected places in eastern Ukraine.
Further information: Libereco
Purchase of buses for the evacuation of people from Kyiv
Amount: 35,600 Euro
Description: In cooperation with the Dresden-based company Gigahertz Ventures
and their initiative “Buses Full of Hope”, Libereco brings coaches to Ukraine. These buses are urgently needed there for the evacuation of people from particularly embattled war zones as well as for general use within Ukraine. Gigahertz Ventures has already organized the transport of four buses. With the help of donations, the purchase as well as the transfer of vehicles is financed, and they are then handed over to the non-profit organization CFSR (Charity Foundation Source of Revival) in Ukraine.
More information: gigahertz.ventures, ARD
Evacuations from Eastern Ukraine with Vostok SOS
Amount: 25,000 Euro
Description: Together with our partner organization Vostok SOS, we bring more than thousand people to safety every month. In addition to vehicle donations, Libereco finances the running costs for fuel, maintenance of the vehicles and wages.
More information: Spiegel (from minute 0:55)
Stretchers, rescue sheets and wheelchairs for evacuations
Amount: 29,000 Euro
Description: For the evacuation of sick and bedridden people, we provide our partner Vostok SOS with materials such as, rescue sheets, incontinence products and wheelchairs. These are completed by stretchers and other materials which were donated to us by various Swiss organizations.
Libereco’s work on the ground
Amount: 17,500 Euro
Description: In order to support our partner organization Vostok SOS in the current difficult situation and to provide aid transports to Ukraine, Libereco has sent several employees and volunteers to the Slovak-Ukrainian/Hungarian-Ukrainian borders and directly to Uzhhorod. Libereco is on the ground assessing needs, coordinating with local partners and helping Vostok SOS build capacity at its new location.
More information: WOZ
Defibrillator for an ambulance
Amount: 15,300 Euro
Description: Ambulances are urgently needed in Ukraine. Libereco has purchased a new defibrillator for a second-hand vehicle of a Polish initiative, so that the ambulance’s emergency team can save lives in Ukraine.
Medical products and other relief supplies, organisational support for transport
Amount: 12,700 Euro
Description: At the end of April, the St. Ida Gremmendorf scouting group from Münster organised a transport with food, hygiene products, firefighting supplies and other relief goods for Ukraine. Libereco assisted in planning and organising the transport and financed medical products and urgently needed equipment for VostokSOS.
More information: DPSG St. Ida Gremmendorf
Purchase and transfer of a humanitarian aid transporter
Amount: 12,000 Euro
Description: Libereco bought a used white Mercedes Sprinter transporter, transferred it to Ukraine and handed it over to Vostok SOS. The vehicle has been used to transport humanitarian goods and to evacuate people since the beginning of March and replaces an old vehicle. A blue Renault Traffic had previously served Vostok SOS as a humanitarian aid vehicle for years. It was so dilapidated after hundreds of thousands of kilometres on bad roads in eastern Ukraine that it urgently needed to be replaced. This was made possible by crowdfunding in Switzerland at the end of 2021.
More information: Arte
Purchase of a second transporter for humanitarian aid
Amount: 10,600 Euro
Description: As more capacity is needed in Ukraine for both evacuating people and transporting relief supplies, Libereco purchased a second Mercedes van and transferred it to Ukraine in mid-April. The vehicle was packed with urgently needed hygiene products and other technical equipment for Vostok SOS.
Reconstruction of the Human Rights House in Chernihiv
Amount: 10,000 Euro
Description: We supported the Human Rights House in Chernihiv to reconstruct and renovate their building, which had been destroyed by the Russian army.
Technical equipment for Vostok SOS’s temporary office
Amount: 8,400 Euro
Description: Due to Russia’s attack on Ukraine, Vostok SOS had to leave its main office in the capital Kyiv and the two regional offices in Severodonetsk and Mariupol in a hurry. Our partner organization has now set up a temporary office, including a large warehouse, in Uzhhorod on the border with Slovakia. Libereco bought IT and office equipment, radios, mobile phones and conference material in Germany and transported them to western Ukraine to restore Vostok SOS’s ability to function effectively.
Establishment of an emergency shelter and co-working space in Ivano-Frankivsk
Amount: 7,500 Euro
Description: Under the auspices of the local youth council, a temporary emergency shelter and co-working space was set up in Ivano-Frankivsk for 40 displaced Ukrainian activists and journalists from eastern Ukraine and other war-affected regions. The donations were used, among other things, to install a new water connection for the kitchen, to renovate sanitary facilities and showers, and to cover the running costs for water and electricity.
More information: Drukarnia
Laptops for online teaching
Amount: Donations in kind worth tens of thousands of Swiss francs
Description: In cooperation with Labdoo Switzerland, we collected over 100 laptops and brought them to Ukraine. They are used by internally displaced teachers and school children for online lessons.
Over hundred mattresses for Uzhhorod
Amount: 6,300 Euro
Description: Due to the war, millions of people from other parts of Ukraine have fled to the west of the country. In Uzhhorod there is currently no more rentable housing or free hotel beds. To increase the capacity in emergency shelters, Libereco has bought a total of 109 mattresses in Slovakia and delivered them to neighboring Ukraine.
Transport of Ukrainian refugees to Berlin
Amount: 6,100 Euro
Description: In the first days immediately after the large-scale Russian invasion, Libereco hired coaches to bring refugees from the Polish-Ukrainian border directly to Berlin.
More information: ZDF (from minute 29:00), ARD, RND
Support for the health centre in Trechizbenka and humanitarian aid for communities in eastern Ukraine
Amount: 5,000 Euro
Description: Libereco has been supporting the health centre in Trechizbenka in eastern Ukraine for several years. The polyclinic itself was razed to the ground in the first days of the war. The director, Lila Shvets, is trying to continue providing help to vulnerable people, and we are supporting her efforts.
Recreational holiday for children from Butcha and Vorzel
Amount: 5,000 Euro
Description: For three dozen Ukrainian children between the ages of 7 and 14, we have provided rehabilitation in Greece. Some of them lost their homes to the Russian war of aggression and/or were stuck in Butcha and the neighbouring village of Vorzel during the occupation. The time abroad was for the children’s recovery and recuperation.
Aid transport from Barcelona to Ukraine
Amount: 3,000 Euro
Description: The Ukrainian Consulate General in Barcelona had collected humanitarian goods in March, which it wanted to hand over to Vostok SOS. As the consulate could not finance the transport to Ukraine, Libereco stepped in.
Support of the Free Belarus Center
Amount: 2,000 Euro
Description: Libereco supports the Free Belarus Center, which has organized the evacuation of Belarusians from Ukraine after the war began. People from Belarus had fled to Ukraine after the brutal suppression of protests against dictator Alexander Lukashenko and now had to flee again.