I don’t want this war, insists invasion mascot ‘Babushka Z’
SHE was immortalised in statues and murals in Russia by pro-war fans for waving a Soviet flag at Ukrainian soldiers, but “Babushka Z” has now said it was all a mistake.
A video from Ukrainian channels showed Anya Ivanova, an old woman who had lived in a village in north-east Ukraine with her husband before she became a pro-war hero, denying she was in favour of Russia’s invasion.
In the scratchy, heavily edited video, she appeared to say: “I’d rather not have this celebrity or this war. I don’t want it. We’d be better off without this war.”
The source of her apparent fame is a video repeatedly played on Russian TV a month ago, of Ms Ivanova carrying a Soviet flag as she walked out of her house towards two Ukrainian soldiers.
The soldiers, wearing Ukrainian flags on their shoulders, said they had arrived to help the two old pensioners, giving her loaves of bread and a bag of food.
They then took the flag off her and stamped on it, prompting Ms Ivanova to hand back her food and tell the soldier her “parents fought for that flag in World War II”. The sight of Ms Ivanova defying the Ukrainian army became a rallying point for pro-war Russians.
On Wednesday, Russian officials unveiled a statue of Ms Ivanova and her flag in Mariupol, the Ukrainian city the Russian army “liberated” by bombing it into the ground.
The problem for Kremlin propagandists is that Ms Ivanova has now said she feels misunderstood. “I just came out to tell them not to crush us, to resolve things peacefully and now I’ve ended up a traitor,” she said in the new video.