Viewers have praised David Tennant for his emotional speech about the Ukraine crisis.
The Doctor Who star presented part of BBC’s Comic Relief on Friday night (18 March), during which he addressed Russia’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine.
Tennant became visibly choked up as he spoke directly to the camera.
“There’s [the crisis in] Ukraine and I don’t know about you but I find it very hard to see past that at the moment. I think it hit me because I feel so helpless because there’s a wee girl in a basement singing the same song that my kids grew up singing. It’s so scary and it’s so wrong,” said the actor.
Earlier this month, a clip of a young Ukrainian girl singing “Let It Go” in a bomb shelter went viral.
The blue and yellow Ukrainian flag can be seen behind the girl as she performs the song from the hit 2010 Disney film Frozen.
Tennant continued to speak about how important Comic Relief is, adding: “Once a year we do this thing together that reaches across borders and it reaches out to strangers.”
Viewers at home praised the actor for his moving speech.
One viewer said: “After seeing David Tennant’s piece on #Ukraine I gave a donation!”
Another added: “Literally sobbed when David Tennant was talking about Ukraine… donated immediately.”
“A very powerful and touching speech about donating towards helping the Ukraine families,” wrote someone else.
A fourth person said: “I feel like David Tennant isn’t speaking from a teleprompter talking about Ukraine, those are his words and I love this man.”
Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky has condemned Russian troops for creating a “humanitarian catastrophe” in Ukraine, and is calling on Russian leader Vladimir Putin to engage in direct talks with him.
Russian forces are deliberately preventing essential supplies from reaching besieged cities to force Ukrainians into cooperation, Zelensky said in a late-night video speech on Friday (18 March).
You can follow live updates of the Ukraine-Russia crisis here.
The Independent has a proud history of campaigning for the rights of the most vulnerable, and we first ran our Refugees Welcome campaign during the war in Syria in 2015. Now, as we renew our campaign and launch this petition in the wake of the unfolding Ukrainian crisis, we are calling on the government to go further and faster to ensure help is delivered. To find out more about our Refugees Welcome campaign, click here. To sign the petition click here. If you would like to donate then please click here for our GoFundMe page.
