Meet The Core Dev Using Bitcoin For Humanitarian Aid On The Ground In Ukraine

Demonstrating its unsocial inferior connected the biggest satellite signifier of the moment, Bitcoin has helped Ukrainian equipped forces and nongovernmental organizations raise money from overseas supporters to combat backmost against Russian penetration that began successful late February amid rising tensions betwixt the 2 countries arsenic Ukraine sought to forge person ties with the European Union and NATO.

But military help isn’t each that Bitcoin has facilitated for the Ukrainian people. The peer-to-peer (P2P) currency is besides enabling a prolific Bitcoin developer to person international, pseudonymous donations to meet section request for backing and humanitarian aid arsenic Russian troops beforehand to onslaught caller cities.

“I effort to absorption connected fulfilling tiny backing requests from a tiny web of volunteers connected the spot successful Kyiv and different cities,” Gleb, a Bitcoin developer primitively from Kharkiv, Ukraine, told Bitcoin Magazine. “Unfortunately, this doesn't enactment for Kharkiv due to the fact that logistics is messed up, and wealth is astir useless there. So, we person to load our trucks oregon bid cabins by ourselves here, and nonstop them that mode manually.”

Gleb and his squad packed a van with food, apparel and aesculapian supplies to assistance children successful Kharkiv. The supplies reached their destination successful 1 day, Gleb said, aft their operator loaded up a bid compartment headed to the city. Image courtesy of Gleb.

A Sovereign Battle

While Russian President Vladimir Putin tries to suggest that Russians and Ukrainians are 1 people, alternatively than 2 abstracted nations, successful a bid to legitimize his invasion, Ukrainians are lasting their crushed and tapping their sovereignty.

“The Soviet Union tried hard to beforehand this narrative, for illustration by banning Ukrainian connection and forcing deportations of full Ukrainian villages and replacing them with Russians,” Gleb said of the struggle astatine large. “Pointing [to] our similarities brings lone antagonistic emotions to Ukrainian people, due to the fact that they were often forced connected america to regenerate the unsocial things, and presently Putin takes the aforesaid strategy.”

Gleb has been a Bitcoin Core contributor since 2018, having given several talks astir Bitcoin and Bitcoin improvement implicit the years. More recently, helium co-authored the CoinPool achromatic paper, describing a Bitcoin scaling connection that enables users to permissionlessly behaviour off-chain payments portion sharing the aforesaid UTXO. The insubstantial was released days earlier the outset of the Russian-Ukrainian war.

Gleb began his Bitcoin travel years agone arsenic helium worked connected gathering Ukraine’s largest cryptocurrency exchange, Kuna. The developer seized the accidental to dive deeper into protocol-level Bitcoin improvement aboriginal on, during a master’s programme astatine the University of British Columbia successful Vancouver. Gleb’s foray into the westbound led him to enactment with Bitcoin companies Blockstream and Chaincode and to determination to New York.

“When COVID started, I had to determination backmost to Ukraine owed to paperwork, but I ever thought it was temporary,” Gleb said. “When the paperwork issues were over, I realized I privation to enactment successful Ukraine due to the fact that it’s location and I emotion it here: the people, freedom, accelerated improvement of everything.”

However, Ukraine’s maturation deed intermission erstwhile the state was invaded, starring galore to displacement absorption into helping their neighbors successful immoderate mode they can. For Gleb, this meant leveraging his Bitcoin expertise to facilitate receiving donations internationally and conducting commercialized locally.

“Bitcoin was a large instrumentality to fundraise, archetypal of all. I conscionable can’t ideate doing this via fiat,” Gleb said. “Second, it’s precise liquid here, truthful a large instrumentality to get USD oregon EUR oregon UAH [Ukrainian hryvnia] for section missions arsenic well. For immoderate missions, I wage successful bitcoin consecutive up. For example, we bought 2 utilized vans successful Poland with bitcoin. The cars are past utilized by my trusted drivers to present worldly to the warzone and evacuate people.”

The developer is tasked with doing a small spot of everything, including managing the received funding, coordinating interior and outer volunteers and moving intimately with his squad members to present the indispensable enactment wherever it is needed most. But Gleb doesn’t enactment alone; his squad is composed of 1 idiosyncratic getting inbound requests and managing logistics, 2 drivers and 4 on-the-spot volunteers located successful Kyiv and Kharkiv.

Gleb (left, standing) and portion of his squad find screen successful a weaponry structure underground aft Ukrainian forces detected a hostile rocket oregon craft flying successful their direction. Image courtesy of Gleb.

Using Bitcoin On The Ground In Ukraine

“We intimately cooperate with 2 different groups: 1 radical of highly-creative startup radical streamlining logistics crossed the border, and a radical of adjacent Bitcoin-minded friends focused connected sourcing worldly from abroad,” Gleb said.

The Bitcoin developer explained that, portion immoderate suppliers volition judge bitcoin, others similar fiat. To capable successful the gap, the radical has relied connected a Telegram bot antecedently utilized successful times of bid to merchantability bitcoin for debit paper fiat erstwhile a month.

“Now, their squad provides maine with their cause connected the spot. He manages each deals successful a P2P way,” Gleb said. “I needed $2k currency to bargain a car. I went to the agent’s place, and different feline came with USD cash. The woody happened close there.”

The car was purchased to nonstop $20,000 worthy of aesculapian supplies and $10,000 worthy of nutrient and children supplies to Kyiv, Gleb said.

The setup is much reliable and businesslike than banks, helium added, arsenic the accepted strategy tin sometimes instrumentality a mates of hours due to the fact that of issues connected his agent’s side. Moreover, portion his cause charges a 1% interest to person from hryvnia into U.S. dollars arsenic needed, a akin alternate successful a accepted currency speech would complaint astir 25%, helium said.

Most of the enactment done by Gleb and his squad relates to funneling the bitcoin donations received into areas that request the astir support. Sometimes they volition bash the packaging and shipping themselves, different times they volition nonstop wealth straight to different volunteers successful antithetic locations who tin put the indispensable supplies successful cities nether attack. Image courtesy of Gleb.

“These are cargos funded by cars,” Gleb said. “For 1 travel from Western Ukraine to Kyiv, we bought a car, packed it with humanitarian cargo and sent our operator there. The car volition stay successful Kyiv for volunteering needs locally.”

In different instance, the developer funded section efforts successful Kyiv and Chernihiv by sending wealth to his trusted volunteers connected the ground, who bought and drove nutrient to shelters wherever orphans were hiding.

While hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians person tried to fly the state to flight the war, Gleb chose to enactment and assistance empower on-the-ground efforts to proviso aesculapian and nutrient assistance to the victims of the Russian invasion. He was successful Kyiv erstwhile the archetypal bombings began, and drove to West Ukraine arsenic helium thought Russia would determination astatine speedy strides and yet prehend the capital.

“My friends past drove to the borderline to permission the country, but I decided to stay,” helium said. “I felt I could beryllium utile here, successful 1 mode oregon another. So I conscionable relocated to a spot wherever I tin beryllium much useful, wherever I don’t person to walk hours successful shelters: a tiny municipality successful Western Ukraine.”

As for adjacent steps, Gleb said that it is hard to program astatine the infinitesimal arsenic helium struggles to flooded the “denial phase” — arsenic helium enactment it — successful which helium wishes things could get resolved successful a week. However, the squad has agreed connected a “backup plan” to determination to the countryside, successful a safer portion of Ukraine, if the warfare doesn’t statesman to upwind down soon. Gleb explained that their program B is to acquisition a location with idiosyncratic funds “and larn to unrecorded there.”

Amid the rising struggle and regular humanitarian efforts connected the ground, Gleb has recovered immoderate clip to make a step-by-step guide for Russians funny successful anonymously donating bitcoin to Ukrainian efforts. The group’s main donations leafage is besides live, moving connected a BTCPay Server lawsuit that automatically generates a caller code for each donation. As of March 9, the radical has raised 3.1 BTC, which has each been spent connected its humanitarian assistance efforts.

“While hoping this volition extremity connected a alternatively affirmative enactment soon, we are acceptable to proceed our ngo if we negociate to fundraise much bitcoin,” Gleb said.