Seven-year-old Karolina plays the piano at the Ukraine House cultural center here in the nation’s capital, poking at keys, swinging her sneakers underneath. She could be any child playing the piano – except the legs swinging below the bench are prosthetic.
Karolina lost her legs last fall in a Russian attack on the Ukrainian city of Nikopol and came to the United States to receive treatment.
Sitting with Karolina is Ukraine’s ambassador to the United States, Oksana Markarova, who helped arrange the young girl’s care.
Visits like these are now typical for the wartime ambassador.
“It’s running a marathon and just doing every day whatever you can do, in order to move our country a little bit closer to the victory,” Markarova told CNN at the Ukrainian Embassy late last month. “It’s definitely a very difficult, very demanding experience.”
This month marks two years since Markarova became ambassador. She was less than a year into her post when Russian leader Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine on February 24, 2022.
“We were preparing for it,” she recalled. “We knew that the intent to attack us was there, but you never completely believe until, unfortunately, something horrific like war happens.”
Markarova said that for the first couple of months of the war she would wake up and wonder if it was a bad dream.
“Everyone in Ukraine, of course, it’s more difficult for them,” she acknowledged. “As I say always, the bombs are not falling on us here – but we work literally 24/7 since February 24, and we will continue working like that until we win.”
Markarova never envisioned herself in this position. Her background is in finance, and she spent 17 years working in the private sector before serving in Ukraine’s finance ministry from 2015 to 2020. Her original objective as…
Read the full article here