Dear colleagues, friends!

Today is the International Volunteer Day. And today, more than ever, deeply and sharply, our country, my homeland, Donbass, my countrymen feel the strength and importance of volunteer missions. Volunteers are waiting, volunteers are hoping, volunteers are believed. And this deserves huge, great respect! 

On this day, I would like to express my sincere gratitude to all our SCM Group Volunteers: the Group's employees, the Shakhtar football club, my Charity Foundation and the Humanitarian Headquarters. What you do today, sincerely helping others, is, in fact, a solid foundation for peaceful and happy tomorrow.

I want to express the words of deep gratitude to all our partners, friends - who, by the will of the heart, 24 hours a day, devote themselves to the task of saving the lives and fates of thousands of civilians, helping those in need: the elderly, children, sick and disabled.

What do you need to have a person in order to help others? I spoke many times about this in our charity events. But today I want to repeat it again.

The first one is - you need to have good eyesight to see someone else's pain. The second one is to have a great heart to perceive someone else's pain as your own. The third one - it is necessary to have a light head to solve numerous problems and achieve the result. But today it is not enough. Today it is still necessary to have colossal courage to work in the most difficult conditions, with a constant risk to life.

And I want to tell you, colleagues, friends, thank you very much for your sharp eyesight, for your kind heart, for your self-sacrificing courage.  

Thanks to all of you, peaceful residents of Donbass receive the vital help, see and feel that they have not been left in trouble. And this is very - very important! Because only all together - hearing each other, feeling each other, helping each other - we will return the world to our home, the world on the Donbass, peace in our country.   

With deep respect  

Rinat Akhmetov