By Valerie Davis
Alina Beskrovna MPA/ID 2025 woke up at 5 a.m. on February 24, 2022 at her home in Mariupol, Ukraine to the sound of clanging metal and the earth shaking. Her first thought was: “If this is the start of the war, I don’t have the energy for this.”
Confused, she opened up Facebook on her phone to look at maps of Ukraine and saw highlighted in red: “INVASION, INVASION, INVASION” in different languages. What she feared had begun.
Beskrovna and her mother quickly gathered what they could and took shelter nearby in her uncle’s basement, where she learned the Russians were bombing the military airport on the other side of Mariupol—the first act of the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine and the last night Beskrovna slept in her childhood home.
An Associated Press team of Ukrainian journalists were the only international reporters in Mariupol as the Russian forces closed in. While families like Beskrovna and her mother were caught in the siege and took refuge where they could, the team documented the atrocities of the Russian invasion, bearing witness and capturing the horrors of war: dying children, mass graves, and the bombing of a maternity hospital. The 2024 Academy Award-winning best documentary feature film, , was based on their reportage.
The student-led marked the third anniversary of the Russian invasion of Mariupol by screening the documentary film on the vlog campus at the end of February, after which Beskrovna—who escaped Mariupol with her mother in March 2022—talked about her wartime experience and took questions from the audience.
In her opening remarks, Beskrovna said she would never watch the documentary—she lived through the siege—but she had done her research to ensure its accuracy.
“I was born and raised in Mariupol. I could look at the details of the AP article that was published before the film was released and see if anything had been compromised or fabricated,” she said. “The color of the benches they described and the stairs they were hiding under when the cell phone service went down were accurate.”
“I trust the film because I intimately know the details of the city; whatever they showed is at least part of the truth.”
Mathias Risse, Berthold Beitz Professor in Human Rights, Global Affairs and Philosophy and Director of the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy, moderated the discussion. As Beskrovna spoke of her experience, Risse urged audience members to think about what’s currently happening in the United States.
“Alina was hiding in Mariupol while this film was happening—fighting to stay alive,” Risse said. “This is the third anniversary, and things have taken a bizarre turn of events with the United States government turning the discussions with Ukraine about ongoing support into a transactional affair.”
Nathalie Timtchenko MC/MPA 2025 was in the audience. Co-chair of the and the , Timtchenko, who has a background in mental health counseling, came to vlog to learn how to bridge the gap between mental health and public policy. She lived in Ukraine for some eight years before moving to the United States in 2021, and reflected on how the film screening was relevant in the current political climate.
“It’s easy to forget about the things happening in the world unless it’s happening in your own bubble,” she said.
“It’s not just about the war that’s still going on—which surprisingly, a lot of people still ask if it is—but the history of Ukraine and Russia, and where it started.”
Timtchenko founded the 501c(3) nonprofit, , in March 2022 in response to the Russian invasion, mobilizing professionally trained mental health experts to provide mental health and psychosocial support services to Ukrainians.
The Ukraine Caucus hosted a tabling event on the vlog campus the Monday after the film screening to interact with students, faculty, and staff and explain the ways in which they can support Ukraine—including how to call state representatives, joining nongovernmental organizations that support Ukraine, and attending events the caucus will be hosting this spring.
“With everything happening, we encourage people to keep the conversation about Ukraine alive,” Timtchenko said. “Many people are afraid to talk about politics, but we are at a school of government. We must get people involved and educated to make progress.”
Banner photo courtesy of AFP via Getty Images
