Female students at a school in the city of Izhevsk, the capital city of western Russia’s Udmurt Republic, recently sewed a batch of underwear for Russian soldiers taking part in the ongoing invasion of Ukraine, according to a report by the independent outlet Mediazona, citing a post from the school’s official social media group.
The post said the school’s sewing group, called “Igolochka,” or “Little Needle,” made “a batch of sewn items for fighters from a regiment from Udmurtia in the special military operation zone.”
“Girls in the fifth and sixth grades worked tirelessly for two weeks,” the post read. “The girls made their own modest contribution to helping people in need. These items will be sent to the front and will be useful to the fighters.”
Igolochka received two letters of thanks for the work — one from the medical service of the Udmurt Regiment and another from the group Help the Front Izhevsk («Помощь фронту Ижевск»). Judging by the published photographs, the schoolgirls sewed men’s underwear.
It is not the first known case of children being involved in supplying basic items for the Russian army. The Insider previously reported that in Primorsky Krai, a region in Russia’s Far East, students at special-needs schools and boarding schools were enlisted to sew balaclavas, neck warmers, and “friend-or-foe” armbands for Russian soldiers, doing so under the guise of a contest. In Labytnangi, students in sixth through 10th grade sewed balaclavas and warm clothing for service members after school. After Vladimir Putin announced Russia’s “partial mobilization” in September 2022, schoolchildren in Penza were pulled out of class to prepare accommodation for men drafted into the army, while parents at Russian kindergartens were asked to knit socks for participants in the war.
