the chas time program of the ukrainian voice of america service is broadcast from washington. i am maria prus. congratulations. the president of the european council, charles michel, will take part in the elections to the european parliament in june. if elected, he will leave his post early. if the agreement on the candidacy of the new president of the european council is delayed, this role will be temporarily performed by the hungarian prime minister viktor orbán, because at this time he is hungarian. will preside over the eu. more about the likely

impact of this situation on european aid to ukraine, let's talk with our correspondent at london by bohdan tsyupin. hello, bohdan, tell me what could be the reasons for such a decision by charles michel, because now he is one of the main leaders of the eu. well, first of all, it should probably be noted that charles michel obviously has political ambitions, he has a desire. to continue his political career, his term in office will obviously run out in any case, here is a serious opportunity for him, it is the european parliament elections in june, and charles michel has decided to leave his post perhaps a little sooner, in order to to increase his chances for... further

political opportunities in the european union, that's how he himself said about it these days. i have worked actively and will continue to do so in my european position until the last day. we know that this summer, after the elections in june, is the time for democratic change. after the elections , the european commission will also pass the baton to the new team. therefore, it is right that during this democratic process i will appear before the european voters in full rights. bohdan, what are the real chances that viktor orban is known for his criticism will he still lead the european council with brussels and loyalty to moscow? well, we need to clearly emphasize, prime minister of hungary viktor orban has no chance at the moment.

no one to head the european council, it is said that he could temporarily, or possibly, temporarily perform the duties of the president of the european council, if i remind you once again, for almost the next six months , european leaders will not be able to find a replacement for charles michel, because he will obviously leave his position in case of... obtaining a mandate in the elections of the european parliament, so in europe there is a system according to which each country of the european union has the possibility of the presidency or the presidency of the eu for six months, and for hungary this term falls, starting from july this year until december, until the end of 2024, and that is...

during at this time, in case of any problems, the prime minister of hungary, hungary would take over the necessary powers, the necessary work in the european union, in accordance with the duties of the country presiding over the eu. bohdan, and please remind me what functions the european council performs, as it what role does it play in the provision of aid to ukraine, how in general it may affect the european one. integration of kyiv. so what is the european council? in fact, the european council is the highest governing body of the european union, but it is a meeting of the heads of state and government of the 27 countries of the european union, that is, the leaders of the eu states regularly meet in brussels or sometimes in other countries. it is once a month, sometimes twice a

month, if necessary more often, and they, this council of heads of state and government, decide the most important, all the most important issues of europe. union, therefore, when it comes to such a key issue as aid to ukraine, it is obvious that the european council plays a very important role here, and at the last meeting of the european council, the prime minister of hungary, viktor orbán, on one issue, on the issue of opening negotiations on ukraine's accession to the eu, he left the room and in fact thus allowed the decision to be approved, but used his right. vetoed and blocked the program of financial assistance to ukraine for the next few years, and by the way, soon, at the beginning of february, on february 1 , 2, an early emergency meeting of this european council will take place in brussels

, at which the question of the aid program for ukraine will be discussed again, and attention will again be focused, in particular, on the prime minister of hungary, whom many in europe consider . now actually the closest ally, if not friend , of russia and president putin. thank you, bohdan, this was voa's european correspondent, bohdan tsyupin. and the us supreme court will consider the possible disqualification of the ex-president donald trump from the republican party primaries. this is the solution. may be based on an amendment to the us constitution prohibiting participation in insurrection or insurrection. trump will appear in federal court in washington on tuesday. his lawyers will call for the former head of the white house to be granted immunity from the charges against him . my colleague oleksiy

kovalenko is following the case. hello, oleksiy. tell me what is the importance of the decision of the supreme court. it is important here, first of all, that the supreme court agreed to consider the appeal. the former of the president of the united states, donald trump , in relation to maine, according to which the name of donald trump was removed from the ballots in the primary - this is the primary election in the republican party, and but these decisions both in the case of maine and in the case of colorado, they are put on hold, and we we will only know the final point in this process will be when the us supreme court actually makes a decision on this matter, and it looks like the supreme court will be in a hurry to ... consider this issue, because the first hearings on this issue have already been scheduled for 8 february, and there is a possibility that we will know the decision of the supreme court on this issue before the so-called super tuesday, that is, march 5, when

the primaries will be held in most states, and that is when the actual final point will be put in this process for both colorado and maine, and also nearly 20 states where similar ... cases are pending regarding the use of the 14th amendment to the us constitution, according to trump and the possibility or impossibility of his participation in the republican primary. and tell me, are there any chances that trump will be granted immunity in case where he is accused of trying to overturn the results of the 2020 election. what do experts and observers say? yes, literally this week, literally tomorrow , january 9, there will be a hearing on this. the questions will be a hearing on whether trump is immune from charges of trying to interfere in the 2020 presidential election, conspiracy to interfere in the 2020 presidential election, and inciting

people to participate in the events of january 6. trump himself has repeatedly denied the accusations against him address, and his team is actually going to say why trump should...have immunity from these charges, and why the charges don't make sense, but we've heard statements from special counsel jack smith saying that no person, even if it's a former the president of the united states, it cannot be more legal, we also heard the statements of the regional district judge of the united states of america tanya chutkan on this matter, she said that even the former president of the united states does not have such a card to get out of prison. and regardless of what decision will actually be made by the court in washington, regardless , the losing party will obviously appeal to the us supreme court, and it will be the decision of the us supreme court whether or not to hear the matter if

the us supreme court upholds the decision of the federal court in washington, then this will mean that the case will continue, and let me remind you that the first... hearings on this case, they were already scheduled for the beginning of march. oleksiy, thank you for clarifying all the details of these cases, this was a journalist of the ukrainian service voice of america, oleksiy kovalenko. despite the constant danger of shelling, more than 220,000 residents of donetsk region, who were evacuated since the beginning of the full-scale invasion of russia into ukraine, have returned to their homes. in particular, almost 130,000 locals returned to the kramatorsk district, but not all houses survived. our next story is about the initiative of poltava volunteers who started with... creating modular houses and thus reviving one of the frontline villages.

about this in the story of yaroslava movchan. lyubov doroshenko walks into his new house. there is a lot of work here. some put the walls in order and deal with electricity, others install the stove. the pipe is placed on a cobblestone so that the radiator heats up and is warm. modular house of 40 m2, it has two rooms, a living room and a kitchen. volunteers from poltava, believers of the bread of life church, assembled the hut and built a frost-resistant building in a matter of days. we are building a house using the technology of sandwich panels, fast installation, you can assemble such a house in literally three days. in the summer, poltava volunteers came with a humanitarian mission to mother of god at that time, the pensioner had already been living in the basement of her

house, which had burned down after the attack by the russians . after what she experienced, the woman calmed down a bit and is already thinking about how to arrange a new home, volunteer anna is helping her. now she has already folded the bed linen and covered it. she will still have such a closet and another one for things too, i did not expect, of course, i did not expect, i am grateful that there is such a charity company, a church, a church, thank god, thank god, i will sleep in the warmth, cats, dogs so me too, corners the dogs are with me too, we are waiting for victory, peace. this is still the only modular house in bogorodychny from poltava volunteers.

bogorodicne was under the russians from the summer to september 2022. before the great war , almost 800 people lived here. most of the population was evacuated already during the mass shelling of the village. the period when they began to take the village of bogorodichnye, the russians destroyed the village en masse. they destroyed two in two hours. streets, and then they began to destroy the inhabitants who are moving around the village, if you see, then everything is flying there, and guns, and from tanks, and from everything they have, they just shot people, 64-year-old anatoly smyk says that when his house was destroyed, he evacuated to sumy oblast. my house was damaged, to say the least, i'll tell you now, there were about nine people around the house, that is. after the deoccupation of the village , anatoliy returned to his homeland, restored the homestead, where he now lives with his wife.

before returning to poltava, anna and other volunteers learn about the urgent needs of the villagers. how do you imagine life without light, life without firewood, let's go we collect, i don't have it in my house, and that's all, we don't think. we think something will be restored, but how we will restore it, i don’t even know, john from america, he also covered it and helped with it, well, with the metal, he covered the roof, the donetsk regional military administration says that the village was almost completely destroyed, despite the fact that the locals are returning to bogorodichne, now here 35 people live there, i want the village to be revived and people to return, because they are volunteers. help those who come here. yaroslava movchan, artur shagalin, for voice of america from

donetsk region. from the beginning of the full-scale russia's invasion of ukraine, more than 200,000 ukrainians applied for asylum in the united states. among the biggest challenges for newcomers is obtaining health insurance. to help with medicines and doctor's consultations, volunteers in new york organize special mobile clinics. see how it works. when i arrived in the usa, i found out that she had gestational diabetes, i didn't have time to get insurance, so i had to come to this event to somehow check how my child survived this difficult journey, and i was dropped off by a friend who lives here in new york, a few months ago, she sent me a link to this, this event. this is already

the third medical consultation for ukrainian refugees in new york, which is being conducted by volunteers of the charity fund center to... help ukraine usa together with the medical organization transatlantic medical relief foundation. this charitable institution was founded in 2016 by gynecologist shawn yunaev. sean was born in lviv, but his family immigrated to the united states when he was still a baby. the fund started helping ukraine even before the full-scale invasion of russia, and with the arrival of the first refugees expanded its services. we realized that more and more people were coming to the united states and there was no access to health care. so we decided, in addition to sending medical equipment and money to ukraine, to do something here in the us for the people who are coming. each time , 40 to 50 people come to see the doctors of this mobile clinic. according to sean, most of the refugee patients are older and have chronic diseases, high blood pressure, diabetes, asthma, and therefore need

medication. the least we can give them is this sufficient amount of medicine. they could live on them until they got insurance and more or less got their lives back on track. we also have many tests, an ekg machine and an ultrasound machine. we try as much as possible to recreate a hospital for them here to ensure a minimum level of services. oksana malinovska came to the usa from ukraine a year ago, she already has insurance, but it is still difficult to understand the american health care system and communicate with english-speaking doctors. i would like to communicate more because of the language barrier with ukrainian-speaking doctors and a plus, well, here american doctors are a little different, well, they perceive our complaints

, let's say our diseases, they have a little different medicine, other diseases here. this time , 12 doctors volunteered to examine the patients with honor, all of them volunteers, most of them from countries that were once a part of the ussr. they are simply doctors and people who understand the suffering that ukrainians are going through and are ready to offer their help. nadezhda tikhamirovova and alina sarkisyan have their own medical practice in brooklyn, they are participating in the medical clinic for the second time, lina's grandparents are from ukraine. yeah, my heart goes out to people who are suffering right now, there is a desire to help, that's why we're here, we want to hear if they need help, do they have enough information if they don't have insurance? i don't have ukrainian roots, it's just humanity, i believe that we should help each other, i have many friends and acquaintances from ukraine who brought

relatives here, stress greatly affects people's health and want to help. in the us, the conditions and level of medical care are determined by insurance companies, access to tests, prescription drugs and specialized specialists is through family doctor therapists, such as nadezhda and alina. when we take a blood test, we see what a person needs and already advise and refer to specialists. recently, a person came and hope saved his life. for 5 minutes to do the tests that are needed to receive the documents, and i say, let me examine you completely anyway, and in in the end we took him to the hospital and provided free treatment, he had very high blood pressure, he was already discharged, and afterwards he came and said that if we had not taken him, he would hardly have lived to the end of the day. iryna balaban, the financial director

of the us ukraine aid center, is responsible for the organization. part of the project, medicine, says iryna, is one of the most urgent problems for refugees. in principle, the states provide very good health insurance for people who arrive, but the process of obtaining insurance takes a very long time, there people who should receive medicine immediately and they did not have supplies from ukraine, so, for example, on the example of my parents, they came, we tried for three months to do it. health insurance, they are 60, they are over 65, so we waited 3 months for medicate and my mother was already running out of medicine from ukraine. that's why it was, i knew how important it is for other people, and because she has diabetes, and well , a person cannot live without such drugs, so she needs to

constantly replenish the supply. to help refugees get insurance faster, insurance brokers like yevhen come to the clinic sheremet during the last two years since the beginning of the war, in fact, we have already issued more than 800 insurances for ukrainians, namely for yuya, who are coming. ugh. and a child. and adults and their parents, that is, elderly people as well. ulyana khovanets is another volunteer of the project, she is responsible for regulating the flow of patients. this is very nice and cool, because many parents come to their children who do not have time, for example, for their parents, americans, the american rhythm of life does not allow them to lose a day or two there to go and take their parents to the doctors. pregnant yulia looks much more confident after meeting with sean and his colleagues, the doctor looked at my child, well, how he looked, looked at the stomach, listened to the heartbeat,

looked at my documents, which were made in ukraine before leaving, provided a full consultation and a plan , how to proceed, also like , i have gestational diabetes and they also gave advice on what to do and gave me a device to measure sugar, because here it is different: we plan to help them get maternity insurance, but as a doctor, i will conduct it for free, and we will do everything to cost the birth was covered by insurance, i think we can do it, but the most important thing is that she and the baby will be safe, i'm sure it will be a wonderful birth, the benefactors are already working on... the next clinic, they say they will do it until, while forced migrants will need help, from new york, iryna solomko, pavlo terikhov, voice of america. last year, ukrainians

donated almost 16 billion hryvnias to the three largest foundations. we are talking about return alive, the serhiy prytula foundation and the united 24 platform. however, volunteers, both in ukraine and abroad, say that collecting funds becomes. khrystyna shevchenko will explain how international and ukrainian networks and volunteer networks work in these conditions. the first surge, the desire to help ukraine at the beginning of a full-scale invasion, began to quickly decline, - says ostap korkuna, co-founder of a charity organization that has collected $83 million to help ukraine since the beginning of the war. that's when the full-scale invasion began a year and a half ago. we've seen a huge jump in individual donations, we almost a million dollars were collected every day from ordinary people who dropped in 20, 30, 50 dollars, but people

mobilize quickly and quite quickly run out of resources that they can give instantly. the trend is also observed in europe. british sam bruvery is a former athlete, after the invasion members of the board of directors of the non-profit british-ukrainian organization project finex, which provides. humanitarian aid to ukraine since the beginning of the war. he worries that the war between israel and hamas has only worsened the situation. so i i think that due to the escalation of the conflict in israel , a certain war fatigue is definitely appearing. this obviously takes time and attention from ukraine. i believe that humans can only feel compassion for a limited amount of grief and suffering. therefore, it is important for us that we continue to believe. that people see and understand that this is not a conflict that is 100 million miles away and supposedly affects no one, it affects prices, it affects food all over the world, it affects

geopolitics all over the world. foreigners who currently involved in supporting ukraine, these are mostly those who have certain emotional ties to the country. bruveri himself, for example, lived in kyiv for 5 years and experienced the russian invasion firsthand. but there are people for whom ukraine is just a country on a map. do not feel motivated to help. when i see news about it on facebook or other social networks, i try to avoid it, because it 's too disturbing, especially when you see a picture of how it was before and how it is now. it's sad because there is information, but we can't change anything. it causes depression. so, volunteers resort to creative methods. fundraising, for example, in the us, it is traditional to donate to charity at the end of the year, when americans celebrate thanksgiving and christmas. he also collects funds at

work. it's on your colleagues. adders in this period pay the most attention to nova ukraine. preparations for, for example, corporate donations are literally starting now. everyone, we are in silicon valley. many people, in particular in my circle , work in top companies, there are google, facebook, apple. these companies are taking place different, different under this, holy november, different promotions take place. you can just be a google employee. maybe you don't know how to help. but you just need to nominate new ukraine, tell your colleagues about new ukraine. and the project "empathy for ukraine" was born in the state of massachusetts. volunteer mariana epstein has created a network of volunteers across america who have been sending letters to us congressmen every day for over a year. the letters contain english translations of articles about ukrainians who suffered from the war. we choose those

stories that have a very strong emotional impact, and it starts with ukrainian truth, high-quality journalism, and on the other hand, it can be a post on facebook of a person who has experienced it, emotions drive them to act. as for whether the volunteers themselves are tired, we were told that they are tired, but the sense of responsibility does not allow them to stop. i really honestly believe that it is not only us. the projects that we are leading are not only what we started 10 years ago, but to some extent, they look at us as the face of ukraine here, and if we do not continue our work, then people will really forget about what is happening in ukraine. khrystyna shevchenko, bohdan shevchenko, california massachusetts for voa. download the voice of america mobile application. the application allows.

bypass blocking automatically thanks to the built-in vpn service, read news, watch informative programs and videos, and also listen to podcasts of the ukrainian voice of america service. we conclude with this, maria prus worked for you in the studio. see other stories of the ukrainian voice of america service on our website and social networks, and also subscribe to our youtube channel and telegram. thank you for your trust, see you soon.

we are looking for 16-year-old anastasia pokhylyuk from donetsk region. the official information about the disappearance of the girl came in the summer of 2023. of that year, but it is quite possible that the connection with the infusion was broken much earlier, and this is not surprising, because the child disappeared in the bakhmut district, where the situation has been too tense for more than a year in a row. if suddenly someone knows about the possible whereabouts of anastasia pokhylyuk, or someone has seen the girl before and at least knows something about her fate, call us immediately at...