Ukrainian Club Shakhtar Reaches Out To Wounded Soldiers And War Orphans

The club -- whose lifting of the 2009 UEFA Cup makes it one of only two Ukrainian teams to win a European club competition -- has through its foundation Shakhtar Social spared no expense since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022.

Shakhtar Donetsk's objectives used to be confined to silverware but now the storied Ukrainian football club have loftier aims, financing hospital care abroad for wounded soldiers and finding new homes for orphans. The club -- whose lifting of the 2009 UEFA Cup makes it one of only two Ukrainian teams to win a European club competition -- has through its foundation Shakhtar Social spared no expense since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022. They have paid 100,000 euros ($110,000) each for five severely wounded soldiers to be sent for medical treatment in hospitals in Israel, the United States and Spain.

"You cannot imagine what injuries they have," Shakhtar CEO Sergey Palkin told AFP in a phone interview.

"Two of them are paralysed, others suffered catastrophic wounds in a rocket detonation.

"It is very difficult to control one's emotions when one sees them.

"We want to give them a chance of a normal life. These hospitals have very sophisticated procedures.