{"id":245024,"date":"2026-05-01T07:00:17","date_gmt":"2026-05-01T11:00:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/?p=245024"},"modified":"2026-05-01T12:09:48","modified_gmt":"2026-05-01T16:09:48","slug":"the-war-continues-russia-and-ukraine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/2026\/05\/the-war-continues-russia-and-ukraine\/","title":{"rendered":"The War Continues: Russia and Ukraine\u202f"},"content":{"rendered":"

Russia escalated its war against Ukraine on Feb. 24, 2022,\u00a0expanding an armed conflict and pattern of mass atrocities that began in 2014 and continue today.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Kristina Hook, an assistant professor of conflict management at Kennesaw State University, <\/span>has conducted extensive fieldwork in Ukraine since 2015 and visited the University of Connecticut on April 23 to deliver a workshop and presentation that shared war trends and human\u202fexperiences.\u202f<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

As an anthropologist specializing in analyzing genocides, Hook has worked\u202fin more than 30 countries across Eastern Europe, the Balkans, the Middle East, East Africa, Southeast Asia, and the Caribbean.\u202f<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Last year saw the highest civilian death <\/span>toll <\/span><\/a>recorded in Ukraine since 2022, although since Russia <\/span>occupies<\/a>\u00a0<\/span>around 20% of\u00a0Ukraine\u00a0today, the\u00a0exact\u00a0number of casualties and atrocities are unknown.\u00a0<\/span>Hook said one example of the atrocities is \u201chuman safari\u201d campaigns, in which Russian soldiers target and kill civilians using first-person view<\/span> drones<\/span><\/a>.\u202f\u202f<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Hook said it\u2019s important to listen to Ukrainians tell their stories, since they\u2019re the ones who see the killing firsthand.\u202f\u202f<\/span>When analyzing crimes against humanity through data and\u202finstitutional-based frameworks, researchers often negate\u202fthe power of listening to the people in the crosshairs.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe need to\u202flisten. We need to believe,\u201d said Hook as she challenged the audience to think about who should be considered subject-matter experts in atrocity prevention.\u202f\u202f<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Hook said the Ukraini<\/span>an people find the country\u2019s history to be a source of strength, for instance<\/span>\u00a0the <\/span>Holodomor <\/span><\/a>that occurred from 1932 to 1933. It was a man-made famine executed by the Soviet Union that led to the deaths of millions of people.<\/span><\/p>\n

Ukrainians are\u202fin the midst of it all, analyzing historical and present-day war patterns, and Hook said they have ideas on how to protect themselves – they just need to be heard and believed.\u202f<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Hook said the \u201ccost of the genocidal war that Russia is waging will begin to touch their pocketbooks,\u201d\u202fas Ukraine\u2019s drone interceptors cost significantly less and are striking down Russia\u2019s drones.\u202fIt\u2019s one way that Ukraine is <\/span>neutralizing Russia\u2019s operational capacity to wage war and protect civilians.<\/p>\n

After the start of the war in 2022, the increase in atrocities coincided with topics of genocide retreating from the media, said Hook.\u202f<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWhen there is no media, the perpetrators thrive,\u201d she said, adding that<\/span> there needs to be policy responses to show the perpetrators there will be consequences, including personal sanctions and travel bans.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

This summer, Hook will return to Ukraine to continue her research and said she is looking forward to publishing her book 11 years in the making\u202f,\u202f\u201c<\/span>When the Ukrainian Sun Rises: From the Holodomor to the Frontlines in Moscow\u2019s Century of Violence.\u202f\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

April is Genocide Awareness Month, which serves to remember those affected by mass atrocities, deepen understanding of genocide\u2019s underlying causes, and promote efforts to prevent future violence.\u202fThe workshop and presentation\u202fwere\u202fhosted by the\u202fProgram in Holocaust and Genocide Studies<\/a>\u202f(HGS) at the\u202fUConn\u202fGladstein Family Human Rights Institute.\u202f\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Kristina Hook draws on her long-term ethnographic fieldwork in Ukraine providing\u202fa zoomed-in view\u202fof the war as it is lived and fought<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":237,"featured_media":245040,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_crdt_document":"","wds_primary_category":0,"wds_primary_series":0,"wds_primary_attribution":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2318,2312,2235],"tags":[],"magazine-issues":[],"coauthors":[2706],"class_list":["post-245024","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-dodd-impact","category-hri","category-today-homepage"],"pp_statuses_selecting_workflow":false,"pp_workflow_action":"current","pp_status_selection":"publish","acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-16 18:53:23","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/245024","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/users\/237"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=245024"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/245024\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":245065,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/245024\/revisions\/245065"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media\/245040"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=245024"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=245024"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=245024"},{"taxonomy":"magazine-issue","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/magazine-issues?post=245024"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=245024"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}