How did Zelenskyy’s selfie, filmed just a day after Russia’s first air raid on Kyiv, transcend a message to Ukrainians and become an unlikely instrument of wartime diplomacy?
As the first air-raid siren sounded in Kyiv on 24 February 2022, the world changed. With Russian forces crossing Ukraine’s borders by land, sea and air, the sense of normality was gone.
Yet the siren was followed by a different kind of silence. For a moment, the world seemed to stand still, waiting and watching to see what would happen to Ukraine. Would Kyiv fall? Would the government survive? Would Ukrainians resist?
The answer was already being communicated through Ukraine’s resistance: through the willingness to fight, enlist and defend the country. Within hours, the same message was taken up by Ukraine’s political leadership.
