theguardian.com
Jun 18, 2022
Her husband Volodymyr Zelenskiy is leading his nation’s resistance to Putin’s invasion – and her family is under threat. In a rare interview, she reveals the toll of sudden war
In the early hours of 24 February, Olena Zelenska became aware of the sound of muffled booms somewhere in the distance. As she drifted towards wakefulness, she realised the sounds she was registering could not be fireworks. Her eyes snapped open; she discovered she was alone in the bed. She jumped up and hurried to the next room, where she found her husband, Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy, already dressed for work in a suit and tie.
“What’s going on?” she asked him.
“It’s started,” he told her.
“I had the feeling I was inside a parallel reality, that I was dreaming,” Zelenska says, describing the moment when normal life was interrupted, for her family and her country. Soon afterwards, her husband left for the presidential compound in the centre of Kyiv, to chair a security council meeting that would decide on the initial response to Vladimir Putin’s shocking full-scale invasion of Ukraine. He told his wife she should wait for him to call later in the day with instructions.
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