The Ukrainian Red Cross is the largest humanitarian organization in Ukraine, which has been providing comprehensive humanitarian aid and support to the most vulnerable people for over a century. The Ukrainian Red Cross carries out its humanitarian activities throughout the country: 24 regional and almost 200 district organizations, with more than 8,000 volunteers providing assistance and support to the population every day.
Official name:
Ukrainian Red Cross Society
Areas of activity:
The Ukrainian Red Cross works in close coordination with the public sector, in particular with local authorities in the regions. Its priority areas of activity are emergency and crisis response. In addition, it provides psychosocial and humanitarian support to vulnerable populations. It teaches first aid and provides comprehensive humanitarian care to internally displaced persons. It is involved in the restoration of damaged infrastructure, rehabilitation centers and hospitals, and builds modular towns throughout Ukraine for those who have lost their homes. It provides mobile boiler houses for educational and medical institutions, as well as multi-storey residential buildings and critical infrastructure facilities.
The organization conducts information campaigns on mine risk, healthy lifestyles, blood donation, provides care for single people, disseminates knowledge of international humanitarian law and provides primary health care in remote settlements.
Leadership:
President: Mykola Yefremovych Polishchuk
Director General of the Ukrainian Red Cross Society: Maxim Dotsenko
History of creation:
The International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement was founded on February 17, 1863, on the initiative of Jean Henri Dunant, a Swiss businessman and public figure. The idea was to unite impartial and neutral like-minded people from all over the world to spread the ideas of humanity, rescue the wounded and help those who need it most. Since 1867, branches of the International Cross and Red Crescent Movement have been working on the modern territory of Ukraine.
On April 15-18, 1918, the First Congress of the Ukrainian Red Cross was held in Kyiv. This date is considered the day the Ukrainian National Society was founded. However, at that time the organization failed to achieve international recognition of its independence. Since 1923, the Ukrainian Red Cross has worked as part of the Union of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies of the USSR. Employees and volunteers continued their activities, developing a network of medical and social institutions on the Ukrainian territory, providing humanitarian aid in the context of famine, epidemics and post-war recovery.
The organization actively implemented humanitarian and medical missions during the Second World War, providing medical care at the front and ensuring the restoration of medical facilities and social services immediately after the war, including the creation of a nursing service to support vulnerable populations.
The Ukrainian Red Cross played a key role in the aftermath of the Chornobyl disaster, carrying out evacuations, providing medical and psychological assistance, and implementing effective medical programs. Since Ukraine gained independence, the organization has been actively assisting victims of the Revolution of Dignity, participating in the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic, and organizing assistance for evacuees and victims after the Russian military aggression in 2022.
Currently, the Ukrainian Red Cross is helping to restore damaged households, providing drinking water and water purification products, assisting in evacuations from the frontline areas, providing comprehensive humanitarian support, and informing about the mine risk, which has increased due to massive flooding.
Since 2024, the Ukrainian Red Cross has been a member of the Alliance of Ukrainian Civil Society Organizations.
Contacts:
Address: : 30, Yevhen Chykalenko St., Kyiv — legal address
Kyiv, 3 Dilova St. — actual address
Website: Ukrainian Red Cross
Facebook page: Ukrainian Red Cross
