A postage stamp was very successful in Ukraine, with almost half a million copies sold in just 5 days. The stamp shows the image of a Ukrainian soldier showing the middle finger to the battleship Moskva, the main ship of the Russian fleet, which sank in the Black Sea last Thursday (14).
According to website Pravda, the hype surrounding the stamp was so great that some people began reselling it at a much higher price than the recommended price — collectors faced queues at agencies to get one. After being sold out in many post offices, copies have appeared for resale on various websites at prices that can reach 100 euros (R$508).
“We wanted to print more, but last night’s bombing in Kyiv disrupted the factory’s work and we couldn’t print the required amount,” Igor Smelyansky, general director of Ukrposhta, the country’s postal company, told AFP.
Ukrposhta said that from now on people can’t buy more than 5 sheets of stamps each sheet contains 6 stamps. The agency also canceled applications for stamps via the internet.
“We already have ideas and are preparing new issues, but for now we ask you to keep a cool head when buying stamps by ship. Let them reach as many people as possible,” he says in a Facebook post.
The post also includes a montage featuring the SpongeBob character welcoming thousands of people to his home and selling the famous postage stamp.
But what is the history of the seal?
The stamp was launched in midMarch, but only reached one million in circulation in April.
The picture became very famous in the country because it was associated with the soldiers’ resistance to the Russian army.
The stamp commemorates a group of Ukrainian soldiers from a military garrison on Snake Island in the Black Sea who refused to surrender to the Russians in the early days of the conflict.
Back then, the soldiers, surrounded by Russian ships, including the Moskva, reacted with insults to Russian ultimatums. “Russian ship, fuck off,” radioed one of the soldiers.
After the incident, the Ukrainian government even announced that the soldiers had died in a final Russian attack. But the information was later denied and there was confirmation that they were in detention.
Later the group was released in exchange for some Russian prisoners. During the exchange, the Ukrainian soldier Roman Grybov, who would have been responsible for the famous sentence against the ship Moskva, was released and eventually decorated by the Ukrainian government.
The phrase, uttered by the military, became a slogan in Ukraine to boost people’s morale in the face of Russian attacks and became a symbol of Ukrainian resistance.
Shipwreck of the Moscow River
Ukraine and Russia give different versions of the sinking of the main ship of the Russian fleet, which caused a significant setback to the country’s firepower. In service since 1983, the Moskva was the largest warship lost in conflict since World War II.
New pictures allegedly show the Moskva ship shortly before sinking
PICTURED: MIKE RIGHT/TWITTER
Such was the ship’s standing in the Russian fleet that the Kremlinaffiliated Russian Orthodox Church forwarded an alleged piece of the “Vera Cruz,” the cross on which Jesus Christ was crucified, to the Moskva River in 2020.
The Russian government said the ship suffered an explosion caused by a fire in an ammunition compartment. According to the Ukrainian government, the ship was destroyed after being hit by a missile attack. (For international agencies)