Before the war, Anastasiia Minchukova taught English. Now, wearing heavy protective equipment and carrying a metal detector, she clears away explosives left by the Russian army, making parks for children, fields for planting, and streets for walking safe.
“There is a huge demand on people who know how to do demining,” Minchukova told the Associated Press when asked why she volunteered. “There is so much work to be done, and I think that I’ll be helpful.”
Until a few years ago, clearing land mines was one of hundreds of jobs legally forbidden to women because of holdover laws from the Soviet Union. A law passed in 2018 gave Ukrainian women equality in working jobs legally considered “dangerous,” and women gradually moved into combat positions in the military.
The United States has committed $182 million in humanitarian demining assistance to Ukraine since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion, and 36% of the deminers and other staff are women.
The roles of Ukrainian women in all sectors of life have continued to change completely since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion, said Tetiana Yehorova-Lutsenko, chairperson of the Kharkiv Regional Council, speaking at the U.S. Institute of Peace in March 2023.
Women are overcoming unimaginable hardships to preserve Ukrainian society and meet the challenges brought on by the war, Yehorova-Lutsenko said.
The latest Ukrainian State Unemployment Service (SES) report found that the number of women in construction and mining jobs has nearly doubled since 2021.
One of those women, Krystyna, from the town of Pavlograd, works 500 meters below ground in a coal mine in the Dnipropetrovsk region while her mother cares for her 4-year-old son.
The mine — which provides vital fuel to Ukrainians suffering energy shortages as a result of Russia’s invasion — was in dire need of workers after the start of the war. Many of its male workers — among them Krystyna’s brother — joined the army to defend their country.
Krystyna says she signed up to work in the mine from a sense of duty. “We cannot leave all of this behind and go for other jobs, letting our boys down,” she told Reuters.
These evolving gender roles demonstrate not just bravery but a deep commitment to their nation’s future, Ukrainian first lady Olena Zelenska told the 7th Ukrainian Women’s Congress in November 2023.
“It is hard to live on the pages of a history textbook, but that is what we do. … We didn’t want to break stereotypes this way,” she said.