Ukrainian woman-led group 'Dattalion' expands efforts to document Russian invasion of Ukraine
'Dattalion' CEO Nataliya Mykolska speaks with Fox News Digital about how her woman-led group is expanding its efforts to document Russia's invasion of Ukraine through photos, videos and eyewitness accounts.
The previously anonymous Ukrainian women behind the Dattalion group revealed their identities this week as they expand their efforts to document the Russian invasion that's devastated their country.
Also known as "Data Batallion," the group formed on Feb. 27, three days after Russia's invasion began, as a means of getting journalists and international observers connected to on-the-ground photos, videos and eyewitness accounts of the war.
The women leading the group, some of whom spoke to Fox News Digital in March shortly after launching the open-source database, largely hid their identities at the time for fear of reprisals and cyberattacks. Now, they are revealing themselves because they want to take their work further, in a war with no end in sight.
"It was very important to ensure that while we are going public, the database is not threatened, and the new programs that we started, for example, the witness database is not also threatened," co-founder and CEO Nataliya Mykolska, who had previously concealed her true name, told Fox News Digital. "So now we're saying… that's the right time for us to go public, and in order to develop this project further and in order to show to [a wider] audience what's going on in Ukraine and to show all that the atrocities that are happening, we as founders needs to go public."
From left, Ulyana Khromyak, Igor Ivashchenko (a witness from Mariupol), Lilia Tymoshenko, Valentina Synenka, and Yuriy Halushchak at a 'Dattalion' press conference on May 30, 2022.
Part of the group's expanded efforts are connecting foreign media and governments with witnesses, especially ones who speak English, as well as a global advocacy campaign to get military and economic aid and humanitarian relief. The Dattalion database is organized by every day of the war and users can download and view the images, videos and testimonies of people experiencing the war, which include graphic depictions of Russian shelling and civilian and children casualties.
As of this week, Dattalion has uploaded more than 3,200 videos and 8,300 photos, which have in turn been downloaded more than 30,000 times, according to the group's press briefing. It achieved 2.5 million impressions across its various social media accounts, which include Facebook, Twitter and TikTok. Its eyewitness database consists of more than 40 people, and in addition to Fox News Digital, it's been featured in Harpers' Bazaar, Inside Edition, MSNBC, TIME, and Vanity Fair, among other outlets.
At a press conference on Monday, the organization said its goal remains simple: tell the world the truth about the war and its developments in Ukraine, including the atrocities perpetrated by Russian troops. President Biden has called for Russian President Vladimir Putin to be put on trial for war crimes; an international team is probing the conflict, and Ukraine has already charged Russian soldiers with crimes such as rape, killing civilians, bombing civilian infrastructure, and looting, according to the BBC.
Russian President Vladimir Putin attends a meeting of the Supreme Eurasian Economic Council in Yerevan, Armenia. (Shutterstock)
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The group has seen growth in volunteers and official members in its efforts, both in Europe and in the United States, with journalists and lawyers offering help. Mykolska continues to ask the world to help in any way.
"We are asking the world, please help us to help ourselves. That's our major ask… We just ask to provide us with more military support, like financial support, economic support. But what is most important is we're also asking people, you know, keep donating and keep helping Ukrainian refugees," she said.
Mykolska said she never expected in her former life to be leading such an organization – before the war, she worked as a strategic transformation expert with commercial businesses and think tanks – but as she said Monday, "we all have to play our part for Ukraine to win this war." She spoke with Fox News Digital from Vienna, Austria, where she and her children have been displaced by the war. Her husband is in Ukraine helping get humanitarian aid to war zones, as well as equipment like vests and helmets to the Ukrainian army.
Her story is one of millions of Ukrainians whose lives have been turned upside down in 2022 by the invasion, and the Dattalion is her and others' way of fighting back, while still raising their families and worrying about loved ones still in harm's way.
'Dattalion' CEO Nataliya Mykolska. (Dattalion)
"Everybody says that every one of us has our own front to fight," she said.
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Lilia Tymoshenko was a graphic designer in her prior life and recounted Monday that she cried the first time she uploaded violent images to the Dattalion site.
"I understand that this is really important to share such truths… to make the world see and understand how awful it is to live in this reality," she said.
The press conference on Monday included an account from a Mariupol native who described the terror of being inside a bomb shelter there during Russian shelling.
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"Every day there are more people coming to us and saying we are ready to speak up, we are ready to go public, notwithstanding potential threats to them," Mykolska said. "We believe the world needs to see what we went through."
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