Dienesmindes Venner is a charitable association based in Salling. For many years, the association has provided emergency aid, help and vacations for Eastern Europeans.
The organization was founded in 1991 by the married couple Dan and Ellen Dissing-Madsen, after they had been greatly influenced by a broadcast about conditions in orphanages in Romania. The couple already had a connection to the conditions in Eastern Europe and had several times had children in care for short periods after disasters – in 1986 the Chernobyl accident and later 25 Armenian children from earthquake-affected areas.
Until 2005, when the farm was sold, more than 6,000 Eastern European children were on a 14-day vacation at the couple’s farm “Dienesminde” in Thorum.
After the association started in 1991, they bought a truck and began transporting supplies to many Eastern European countries, including Belarus, Latvia, Romania, Ukraine, Lithuania, Poland, Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Armenia.
Around the turn of the millennium, the association was in financial trouble due to a drop in subsidies and the need for a new truck.
In connection with the Russian invasion of the Crimean Peninsula and Donbas in Ukraine in 2014, and the subsequent war, the association was contacted about the possibility of sending emergency aid to Ukraine, which they agreed to.
When the invasion of the rest of Ukraine began in 2022, the association sent some additional emergency aid to Ukraine, but also distributed emergency aid in Denmark to the Ukrainian war refugees.
Sources
- about the association (dienesminde.dk) – dienesmnde.dk
- Skive folkeblad 29/8-2016, 17/11-1990, 3/8-2000, 28/4-2022