A Childhood Without War Became the Largest Private Evacuation of Orphans Since World War II
12.12.2024
Ruslan Shostak, President of TERWIN
The ambitious project "Childhood Without War", which lasted three years—1,000 days—has ended.
Undoubtedly, rescuing thousands of children from war and giving them the chance to spend three years without sirens and shelling on the Mediterranean coast was more than a project. It was a mission. I am proud that my team and I were entrusted with such an honorable task.
I won't say it was easy. Though discussing challenges in such cases is often inappropriate, the difficulties were numerous.
It was hard to evacuate the children.
It was hard to keep the project running in Turkey for three years.
It was hard to keep the children within the Ukrainian project and resist transferring them to Turkish state care—we fought for every child and kept them all.
It was hard to bring the children back to safe regions of Ukraine and give them a chance to find families.
To be honest, it was always hard. There were moments when the tasks seemed completely impossible. But our project wasn’t just supported by the Foundation, ministries, embassies, consulates, hundreds of partners, and thousands of volunteers. I believe our project was guided by God, who led us and helped us find solutions in seemingly hopeless situations.
Behind all these numbers lies the immense work of our entire team. But the numbers don’t tell the whole story.
There are no numbers to reflect the countless negotiations, calls, and meetings required to make this project happen.
There are no numbers to show the amount of medication and medical assistance we provided to the children—because none of them were completely healthy when they joined the project.
There is no statistic for the incidents of all kinds that occurred during the project, involving both children and adults. The children came from difficult backgrounds, and everything that could have happened, did happen. But most importantly…
All the children are alive and as healthy as possible—much healthier than they were before the project. They have all returned to Ukraine to find families.
This project changed the lives of everyone involved. And it changed my life.
Through it, I was reborn as a founder of the Foundation and now dedicate a significant part of my life to charity.
I am committed to ensuring that the children of this project and all Ukrainian orphans find families. I will do everything I can to support the state in this mission.
I completed a foster parent course to better understand the children in the project and the adoption process in Ukraine.
I conducted extensive research to study the issue of orphanhood in our country, and the main conclusion I reached is this: children don’t need additional programs. They need parents. When they have parents, their problems will have someone to address them.
Our society must treat orphans as if they were our own children. Only then can we avoid the situation we faced at the beginning of the project. War struck. Everyone fled, and the children were left alone, facing fear and bombings.
I am proud and happy that this project came to fruition. It became an island of Ukraine and Ukrainian culture in Turkey, serving not only a charitable purpose but also a diplomatic one. Hundreds of guests from various countries considered it their duty to visit the Ukrainian children when traveling to Turkey.
The documentary about our evacuation drew the attention of hundreds of thousands of viewers across many countries and received about a dozen international awards.
In history, this project will be remembered as the largest private evacuation of orphans since World War II.
Once again, I want to thank the Foundation team, Ukrainian embassies and consulates, the Ministry, the State Service for Children's Affairs, EVA and VARUS, as well as all our partners in Turkey, Ukraine, and the United States. Over the years of this project, we became one team capable of achieving much more. This must be remembered. And most importantly—we must start now.
