A NEW ANIMAL RESCUE AMBULANCE is on the road saving lives in Ukraine! (2024)

In a recent appeal, we told you that an ambulance owned by our Polish partner DIOZ had been involved in an accident in the war zone and wasn’t able to be driven or repaired. We urgently needed to get the team back on the road and back to the animals - every day, DIOZ rescues desperate dogs and cats who have no one else to help them.

We are witnesses to death, action, tragedy and pain. This is not a safe West, it's the middle of a bloody war. We hold the enemy's bullets in our hands, we see the corpses, our hearts bleed. Until we saw it, it was abstract to us… Despite the danger, we want to help animals in this most difficult time. (DIOZ, Facebook)

The results of your compassion are clear: with your support, our partners are able to continue their wonderful work for the war-stricken animals of Ukraine.

Our partners on the ground in Poland and Ukraine have not stopped their selfless work for the animals since the war began. So far, your support has enabled them to help thousands of abandoned animals who would otherwise be dead or living on the streets, their days numbered.

• ADA Foundation has moved a number of cats into the Adaptation Center you helped pay for. Here, they receive round-the-clock care, attention and love as they heal from their injuries and the trauma of war.

• Ukrainian vet Dr. Pavlina Harasym has recovered from the exhaustion which landed her in hospital last week. For the next two weeks, she’ll be working alongside DIOZ at its shelter to help treat all the sick and injured animals its team recently rescued from Ukraine.

• Our ambulances are continuing to do nonstop runs into Ukraine to deliver food and medicine and this week, managed to reach the obliterated city of Kharkiv. We’re also sending more money to our partner, the Kyiv Animal Rescue Group (KARG), to put towards a new animal rescue van.
• Rescued Ukrainian animals continue to be cared for at the house rented by DIOZ and Dr. Pavlina in Lviv as they figure out a way to get them across the border into Poland. Volunteers remain at the house to care for the animals 24/7.
• Vetmarket Pluriton has repaired its manufacturing plant and is once again able to produce pet food. We purchased 5 tons (5,000 kilograms) from Vetmarket and delivered it to the Kyiv Hippodrome, where the survivors of the Borodyanka shelter are being cared for. The food will also be distributed to other desperately needy animals in the region.

• Ecoprotection of Starokostyantyniv (EPS) has finished building the enclosures we helped fund and now has space to take in even more animals (believe it or not, animals continue to pour into shelters - the need seems never-ending). We’ve also helped EPS purchase another 120 bags of pet food before prices rise again. The team now has some 330 dogs in its care, and while adoptions are happening all the time, abandoned animals continue to arrive on EPS’s doorstep.

• Anzhela and her network of animal guardians (or should we say animal heroes?) continue to feed animals on the streets of Donbas as rockets fly overhead. Many of these guardians are elderly, sick or disabled, yet they are out on the streets every day, whenever there is a lull in the fighting, to feed the animals who have somehow managed to survive the heavy shelling and destruction of the past several weeks. One of the guardians recently broke down the fence of a neighboring house to rescue a dog who had been abandoned inside. The animal was found starving and bleeding profusely, but we are happy to report that the dog is now safe and in the care of Animal Guardians.

The animals have been suffering for more than 6 weeks. Those who are miraculously still alive are edging ever closer to a lonely and painful death.

We are doing our best to reach as many as we can, but it is difficult and dangerous, and we can only do it with your continued support. The ambulances, fuel, shelter, medication and the tons and tons of food have all been made possible thanks to your generosity and pure love for animals. Without this support from you, none of our work would be possible, and countless animals would be left out in the cold to die, utterly alone.

An animal tragedy of unimaginable proportions is unfolding in Ukraine - animals really, truly, desperately, need help on an epic scale - we will fight for each and every one of them, but we can only do as much as our supporters allow us to do. Your donation is so important. Please contribute as much as you can today.

THANK YOU for being a friend to the animals of Ukraine, and THANK YOU for staying by their side. They’ve never needed it more.

For the animals,

Brian and Gloria Davies (and Max and Flora!)
Founders
Network for Animals

P.S. As long as the war continues, we will be there for the animals. And once it’s over, we’ll be on the ground, helping every single one of them we can. This is only possible with your continued kindness. Please donate now, whatever amount you are able to, and know that it will be used to bring comfort, protection and love to an animal who desperately needs it.

Image credits: Banner: Rodrigo Abd/Associated Press/Atalayar; image 1, 3 & 5: DIOZ;image 4: ADA Foundation ; image 6: VetMarket Pluriton; image 7: Ecoprotection of Starokostyantyniv; image 8: Animal Guardians; image 9: @Firsov_Donetsk/Dominic Dyer/Twitter; image 10: Zohra Bensemra/ Reuters/SkyNews