The journalists talked to a Ukrainian old woman from Kharkiv, who joined the Ukrainian Armed Forces with the flag of the Soviet Union, and when they trampled on her, she refused to take a humanitarian aid. Because of this, in Russia, “the grandmother” was made a symbol of the occupiers — she is depicted on murals and monuments are created both in Russia and in the occupied territories of Ukraine.
The story of the grandmother was told by BBC journalists.
70-year-old Anna Ivanivna lives in Velyka Danylivka. Legally, it is a neighborhood in Kharkiv, but in fact Velyka Danylivka remains a village with private houses. At the beginning of the war, hostilities continued quite close to this area, in the village of Tsyrkuny near Kharkiv, but the Russian military did not enter Velyka Danylivka.
My grandmotherʼs house was also damaged by Russian shelling: the windows in her house were broken, the roof was damaged, and shell fragments still lie in the yard. However, Anna Ivanivna herself does not complain about this because she says that it could have been worse.
The conversation recorded in the popular video took place on March 4. Lieutenant of the Armed Forces of Ukraine Viktor Kostenko talked to his grandmother.
"As we always do, we asked how they were doing and whether they had food. My grandmother replied that she had nowhere to go and that she was very much waiting for us, and — I will not quote her words right now — she had been praying for the Russian troops all this time because she was tired of the war. She added that she has a Russian flag to meet us," he said.
Then Kostenko asked her to bring a flag, and he asked another soldier to take pictures on the phone. An old woman went home and returned with the Soviet flag.
"I donʼt know what was going on in my head," says Anna Ivanovna about that day. She says she heard Russian from the military at the time and decided it was Russian. The grandmother also voices another version: she says that she thought that the Russian military would definitely have Putinʼs phone, and she would like to call him and ask him to stop the war. There is also a third version: Anna Ivanivna calls the Soviet flag "a sign of love and victory".
"I did not take it to the Russians; the Lord brought me to the Ukrainians. There will be victory with them! God bless you!" She says.
The center of strategic communications at the Ministry of Culture of Ukraine was the first to find Anna Ivanivna. One of the employees, Dmytro Halko, says that Anna Ivanivna is a bit "artistic" and therefore "changes versions from interview to interview".
Lieutenant Kostenko said that after the conversation, which was recorded on video, the soldiers went on because the shelling started, the grandmother took the flag, and her husband picked up a bag of groceries, and they went home.
"And then we became friends with the old woman, a day later we brought her food, on Easter they brought Easter cake from the Ukrainian Church," Kostenko said.
When the grandmotherʼs house was shelled, the Ukrainian military advised them to evacuate. At first, they were taken to a local church, but Anna Ivanivnaʼs husband had health problems and was taken to a hospital in Kharkiv. A few days ago, they returned to their home and started farming.
"It would be better for me not to be famous... Celebrity is, of course, a big deal, but it should be deserved. And I donʼt know, maybe I didnʼt deserve such a celebrity," she says.
Journalists showed the old woman many pictures of how monuments to her were erected in Russia, and pictures were painted with her. Anna Ivanivna liked some of them, and she even asked to keep them and criticized some of them, including the one on which she stands on the Ukrainian flag.
"God forbid! I love our flag. Itʼs wrong to draw like that! Trample your flag, who invented it? On the contrary, I love my flag. When the Easter cakes were brought to me, there was a blue, yellow and orange ribbon with a trident. I saved them," she said.
In the village, the attitude of locals towards the old woman deteriorated. Fellow villagers help them with food, but in a conversation with journalists they say that they will be exiles here.
"Today, those who collect garbage are from the city... I was called a traitor. Take a bag, they say, and get out of here. They say — how will you live with it. And I did not want to betray anyone; I wanted peace: Russia, Ukraine, Belarus live as before. That no one insulted anyone, but fought only against drug addiction, alcohol, smoking and the Christian faith!" says the old woman.
At the same time, the Ukrainian military Kostenko protects an old woman. He says that one should not judge a person by the "past" in which she lives. "They do not know the whole story. It is better in independent Ukraine to improve their living conditions so that they remember the Soviet Union as the black past of our state. And to condemn a person simply because she lived in the Soviet Union is wrong," he said. According to the military, the main problem of the old woman is the lack for information because she could not believe for a long time that her village was being shelled by Russians.