Ukrainian esports organisation NAVI and charitable organisation MK Foundation have donated €125,000 (~£106,00) to unmanned robotic complexes in Ukraine.
The money donated is NAVI’s portion that it received for winning the first-ever CS2 Major, held in Copenhagen this March.
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The donation is part of NAVI’s ongoing support towards Ukraine with the organisation making various donations and hosting fundraisers for United24.
NAVI won its second-ever Counter-Strike Major at the PGL Copenhagen CS2 Major. The team lifted the trophy in the Royal Arena and $500,000 (~£392,000) which was then split between the players and the organisation. The team and players also were entitled to sticker money, the figures of which are not publicly shared by Valve.
The Russian invasion of Ukraine began on February 24th 2022 and has continued to this day, with NAVI stating that the reason behind the donation is due to ‘escalation on the frontline’. NAVI responded to the invasion very quickly with the organisation breaking off all relations with Russian companies in March that same year.
The invasion has affected esports in many ways, notably creating restrictions that caused some Russian organisations to compete at event without their branding. This was the case with Virtus.Pro’s CS:GO team who attended and won the IEM Rio Major as ‘Outsiders’. Virtus.Pro was reintergrated back into ESL and BLAST in March 2023.
The invasion also caused the postponement of the WePlay Academy league until the invasion ends and has created many more wide-reaching implications.
NAVI is not the only esports organisation to support Ukraine during this period with 20 professional players representing Astralis, Vitality, Fnatic, ENCE, FaZe, Liquid, MOUZ, BIG and NAVI at Born to be Brave – a tournament hosted in 2022 by NAVI in support on Ukraine.
