Zaluzhny, Commander-in-Chief of the Ukrainian Armed Forces.

(Reuters file photo)

[Compiled Chen Chengliang/Comprehensive Report] "New York Times" reported on the 24th that Valerii Zaluzhnyi, commander-in-chief of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, inherited a legacy of US$1 million (approximately NT$30.25 million) from an American citizen. All the money was donated to the army to defend the country.

The newspaper said the money came from Hryhoriy Stepants, a Ukrainian-American citizen, "Zaluzhny received a million-dollar inheritance, which he transferred to the Ukrainian Army in January for the latter's required expenditure".

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The Ukrainian military confirmed the report to The New York Times.

Zaluzhny told Ukrainian Pravda in a statement: "I have dedicated my life to the armed forces and I have no doubts about what to do with the legacy." Through his support for the Ukrainian army, "I thank everyone who helped the Ukrainian armed forces, and I thank my family for their understanding."

Born in the Ukrainian city of Vinnytsia in 1938, Stepanets fled the Soviet Union in 1989 to work as a software developer in Redmond, Wash., where he invented After a decoding system was sold to Microsoft, he made a fortune.

It is not clear what the relationship between Zaluzhny and Stepanec is.

The New York Times reported that according to data from the Ukrainian central bank, Ukrainian companies and individuals have directly donated 22.3 billion Ukrainian hryvnia (approximately NT$15.1 billion) to the Ukrainian army in the past year.

This far exceeds charitable donations for humanitarian aid in Ukraine, which totaled 920 million hryvnia (approximately NT$6.05 billion).