Army Explosives Expert from North East Lincolnshire in Ukraine
Humanity & Inclusion UK say that more than 40% of the Ukrainian population is in need of humanitarian aid
A North East Lincolnshire man in Ukraine - helping to remove landmines and explosives for locals - says it's a 'frightening' and 'traumatic' place to be living
The country is now set to spend it's 3rd Christmas in war
Gary Toombs from Grimsby is there with the charity Humanity and Inclusion UK - working to support vulnerable and disabled people.
He tells us specifically what he and his team are there for:
"So much of the population left around 2022, but they're now starting to return. Really, a part of our role is to educate them, and how to change their behaviour to live with explosive remnants of war, how they can carry out some kind of normality when there's all of this, danger around them.
"They really have very little resources. They have very limited access to food, shelter, health services and that's because of this constant aerial bombardment that they're under. It's destroyed a lot of the infrastructure. So it really is quite a difficult existence for them who remain here, particularly those on the front line, those areas where we don't have access to because of the fighting."
Gary added that the conditions people are living in is 'freighting':
"It's very cold. I'm currently in Kharkiv, which is in the North East of the country. We're around about, 40 kilometres away from the Russian border. It's an area that has seen quite a lot of fighting in the past and it's really littered with lots of land mines, and lots of explosives.
"It's civilians who really take the impact, you know, they are being impacted, particularly children. There's been lots of traumatic amputations through the use of explosive ordinance, and there is nowhere really safe.
"The bombardments, are quite constant. People go to bunkers, but again, even with the drones and the munitions that's flying overhead. They're doing their best to shoot them down, but if you do, there is still debris, which is also injuring and killing people. So it really is quite frightening place to to be."
The aid charity Gary is out there with work in 60 countries around the world running hundreds of projects in emergency, chronic crisis, reconstruction and development settings.
They rely on the dedication of 5,072 staff around the world, including 4,241 local staff supporting our programmes on the ground. Last year it ran 446 projects in 59 countries.
Garry shares:
"So I work for an organisation called Humanity and inclusion UK, we're an independent international organisation, founded in 1982. We're dedicated really to supporting vulnerable populations of all people, particularly in promoting dignity and human rights.
"We've been present here in Ukraine since February 2022, and we're really providing assistance through thematics including health. This includes things like rehabilitation, inclusive humanitarian actions like mental health, psychosocial support, both at community level and in hospitals. We also are carrying out basic needs so things like basic non food items. Protection and what I'm really specialised in is armed violence reduction when it comes to things like explosive ordinance, that covers a multitude of things like land mines, and submunitions."
To find out more about what this charity do, take a look at their website.