Civilians in Russian-controlled areas of Ukraine are doing something incredibly brave: fighting back.
HuffPost's Akbar Shahid Ahmed wrote about what Ukrainian civilians are doing to resist, from documenting atrocities to publicly protesting. All of this is dangerous, but Ukrainians are doing it anyway to combat the Russian invasion of their country.
We asked Akbar to share more about what he found in his reporting.
How did you learn about what Ukrainian civilians are doing to resist Russians?
Amid bloodshed and unimaginable upheaval, everyday Ukrainians are working hard to document what they're experiencing. They are recording details, shooting photographs and videos, and advising each other on issues like accessing medicine through platforms like Telegram – then ensuring that information gets to the outside world.
People trapped in these Russian-controlled regions are balancing their safety with their desire to hold Moscow to account; often, they maintain anonymity to provide the testimonies trickling out through routes like The Guardian's Kherson diary and interviews with journalists. Academics and national security analysts are gathering and analyzing the information coming out of occupied areas to understand the nature of the resistance. And Ukrainian civil society, from lawmakers in Kyiv to the diaspora across Europe and elsewhere, is tracking that information and talking to trusted contacts inside occupied regions too. I used a mix of these sources to paint a picture of Ukrainian civil pushback to the Russian assault.
How does civilian resistance combat Russia's propaganda efforts?
Russian President Vladimir Putin and his government have spent years arguing against Ukraine's national identity. They claim that it is an invention – that Ukraine is actually just one part of a broad sphere of Russian culture – and that it is dangerous, saying Ukraine's efforts to craft an independent foreign policy are led by brutish nationalists who are the equivalent of Nazis.
The images and stories of Ukrainian civilians shatter those narratives. By rallying around Ukrainian flags even in areas where Russian is widely spoken, Ukrainians are showing that they identify as citizens of a country distinct from Russia despite their cultural backgrounds. Such public defiance makes it much more difficult for Putin to implement his usual tactics, like staging dubious elections or taking over municipal governments and claiming support from locals. Through peaceful demonstrations and publicizing Russian excesses against civilians, Ukrainians are highlighting that Putin's forces are the aggressors in the war. Finally, they are sustaining Ukrainian resolve, convincing their peers to reject Russian aid so they won't be portrayed as being somehow grateful to their invaders and proving that Ukraine is not as easy to vanquish as Russia and even many Western observers believed.
How much danger are these civilians in?
Russian forces have already subjected Ukrainians under their rule to summary executions, rape, abductions and theft, according to on-the-ground testimonials and reporting, Western intelligence, and the independent watchdog groups Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International. People who are suspected of supporting the resistance are especially vulnerable: Multiple reports suggest Russian troops are kidnapping local officials and journalists, and interrogating them to ask who is organizing protests.
But most of these Ukrainians, who have already seen their hometowns battered and then occupied, already know those risks and are taking them into account as they try to undermine the invasion: As Olga Onuch, an expert on Ukrainian society at the University of Manchester, told me, "No one is under any illusion that this is safe."
