In the second month of the Russian invasion, this is now life in Chernihiv, a besieged city in northern Ukraine where death is everywhere.
It is not – yet – as synonymous with horrible human pain as the dusty southern city of Mariupol. But similarly excluded and pounded from afar by Russian troops, the remaining residents of Chernihiv are terrified that every explosion, bomb and body found in their streets traps them in the same macabre trap of inevitable murder and destruction.
“In the basements at night, everyone is talking about one thing: Chernihiv to become the (next) Mariupol,” said Ihar Kazmertsak, a 38-year-old linguist.
He spoke to the Associated Press on his cell phone amid intermittent beeps signaling that his battery was running low. The city is without electricity, running water and heating. In pharmacies, the lists of drugs that are no longer available are growing day by day.
Kazmerchak starts his day in long queues for drinking water, with 10 liters per person. People come with empty bottles and buckets to fill when water trucks go around.
“The food is over and the bombing and the bombing is not stopping,” he said.
Nestled between the Desna and Dnieper rivers, Chernihiv crosses one of the main roads used by Russian troops invading Belarus on February 24 for what the Kremlin hoped would be a lightning strike on the capital, Kyiv. just 147 kilometers.
The city’s peace was shaken, more than half of the 280,000 residents fled, according to the mayor, not being able to be sure when they would then see its magnificent golden dome and other cultural treasures, or even if they would still be standing. RETURN. The mayor, Vladyslav Atroshenko, estimates that Chernihiv’s death toll from the war is in the hundreds.
“Russian forces bombed low-lying residential areas in” absolutely clear weather “and” deliberately destroyed urban infrastructure: schools, kindergartens, churches, apartment buildings, and even the local football stadium, “Atroshenko told Ukrainian television.
On Wednesday, Russian bombs destroyed the Chernihiv main bridge over the Dessna River on the road to Kyiv. On Friday, artillery shells made the remaining footbridge impassable, cutting off the last possible route for people to leave or food and medical supplies to enter.
Refugees from Chernihiv that escaped the siege and arrived in Poland this week spoke of widespread and devastating disaster, with bombs leveling at least two schools in the city center and strikes also hitting the stadium, museums and many homes.
They said that with utility companies stalling, people were taking water from Desna to drink and that strikes were killing people while waiting in line for food. Volodymyr Fedorovych, 77, said he escaped shortly after a bomb fell on a line of bread in which he had been standing a few moments earlier. He said the blast killed 16 people and injured dozens, blowing hands and feet.
The siege is so intense that some of those trapped can no longer muster the strength to fear, Kazmerczak said.
“The destroyed houses, the fires, the corpses in the streets, the huge aircraft bombs that did not explode in the yards no longer surprise anyone,” he said. “People are just tired of being scared and they don’t always go underground.”
With the invasion now in its second month, Russian forces have seemingly stalled on many fronts and are even losing ground previously from Ukrainian counterattacks, including Kiev. The Russians bombed the capital from the air, but did not capture or encircle the city. US and French defense officials say Russian troops appear to have taken up defensive positions outside Kyiv.
As Russia continues to strike and encircle civilian populations, from Chernihiv and Kharkiv in the north to Mariupol in the south, Ukrainian authorities on Saturday rejected statements by the Russian military suggesting it was planning to concentrate its remaining forces on whole of eastern Donbass, Ukraine. area from Ukrainian control. The area has been partly controlled by Russian-backed separatists since 2014.
“We can not believe Moscow’s statements because there are still many inaccuracies and lies on this side,” Markian Lubkivsky, an adviser to the Ukrainian defense minister, told the BBC. “That’s why we understand that the goal of (Russian President Vladimir) Putin is still the whole of Ukraine.”
This skepticism was highlighted hours later when explosions rocked Lviv, a city in western Ukraine about 72 kilometers from the Polish border, where an estimated 200,000 displaced Ukrainians have taken refuge.
Among them is Olana Ukrainets, a 34-year-old IT employee from Kharkov.
“When I came to Lviv, I was sure that all these alarms would have no effect,” Ukrainians told the AP from a bomb shelter after the blasts. “Sometimes when I listened to them at night, I just stayed in bed. Today, I changed my mind and had to hide every time. None of the cities in Ukraine is safe now.”
The British Ministry of Defense said on Saturday that it does not expect a postponement for the citizens of the bombed cities of Ukraine soon.
“Russia will continue to use its heavy firepower in urban areas as it seeks to reduce its own already significant losses, at the cost of further civilian casualties,” the ministry said in a statement.
Previous bombings of hospitals and other civilian facilities, including a theater in Mariupol where Ukrainian authorities say a Russian airstrike believed to have killed 300 people last week, have already sparked war crimes allegations.
Maria Radionova, a 27-year-old resident of Mariupol, said she was standing at the entrance to the Mariupol Drama Theater when she was hit.
“We had debris, bricks and pieces of the wall falling on us,” Radionova told the AP from the town of Zaporizhzhia, where she and other residents were taken. “I saw from the stairs a man probably exploded from the explosion, and fell face down on the (shattered) glass. Nearby, there was an injured woman in a puddle of blood and this woman was trying to wake him up. “
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, appearing on video at the Doha Forum in Qatar on Saturday, compared the destruction of Mariupol with the destruction of Syria and Russia in the city of Aleppo.
The invasion has driven more than 10 million people from their homes, almost a quarter of Ukraine’s population. Of those, more than 3.7 million have fled the country altogether, according to the United Nations. Thousands of civilians are believed to have lost their lives.
In Chernihiv, hospitals are no longer operating and residents are cooking over fireplaces in the streets because the power has been cut off. Utility workers left behind are not enough to repair broken power cords and restore other basic services, and time has become blurred, the mayor said.
“We live without dates and days of the week,” Atroshenko told Ukrainian television.
Ever since a Russian bombing struck a Stalin-era cinema next to his 12-story apartment building, Kazmerchak, a linguist, has spent his nights in a bomb shelter. A Russian rocket also destroyed the hotel near his home.
“The walls were shaking so much,” he said. “I thought my house would collapse every minute and I would be left under the rubble.”
——
Andrea Rosa in Kharkov. Nebi Qena in Kyiv? Cara Anna in Lviv and Associated Press reporters around the world contributed to this report.
Getting in touch
Are you in Ukraine? Do you have a family in Ukraine? Are you or your family affected? Email [email protected]
Include your name, location, and contact information if you would like to speak to a CTV News reporter. Your comments can be used in a CTVNews.ca story.
title: “Russia Ukraine 3 Explosions Hit Outside Lviv "
ShowToc: true
date: “2022-11-25”
author: “James Mitton”
In the second month of the Russian invasion, this is now life in Chernihiv, a besieged city in northern Ukraine where death is everywhere.
It is not – yet – as synonymous with horrible human pain as the dusty southern city of Mariupol. But similarly excluded and pounded from afar by Russian troops, the remaining residents of Chernihiv are terrified that every explosion, bomb and body found in their streets traps them in the same macabre trap of inevitable murder and destruction.
“In the basements at night, everyone is talking about one thing: Chernihiv to become the (next) Mariupol,” said Ihar Kazmertsak, a 38-year-old linguist.
He spoke to the Associated Press on his cell phone amid intermittent beeps signaling that his battery was running low. The city is without electricity, running water and heating. In pharmacies, the lists of drugs that are no longer available are growing day by day.
Kazmerchak starts his day in long queues for drinking water, with 10 liters per person. People come with empty bottles and buckets to fill when water trucks go around.
“The food is over and the bombing and the bombing is not stopping,” he said.
Nestled between the Desna and Dnieper rivers, Chernihiv crosses one of the main roads used by Russian troops invading Belarus on February 24 for what the Kremlin hoped would be a lightning strike on the capital, Kyiv. just 147 kilometers.
The city’s peace was shaken, more than half of the 280,000 residents fled, according to the mayor, not being able to be sure when they would then see its magnificent golden dome and other cultural treasures, or even if they would still be standing. RETURN. The mayor, Vladyslav Atroshenko, estimates that Chernihiv’s death toll from the war is in the hundreds.
“Russian forces bombed low-lying residential areas in” absolutely clear weather “and” deliberately destroyed urban infrastructure: schools, kindergartens, churches, apartment buildings, and even the local football stadium, “Atroshenko told Ukrainian television.
On Wednesday, Russian bombs destroyed the Chernihiv main bridge over the Dessna River on the road to Kyiv. On Friday, artillery shells made the remaining footbridge impassable, cutting off the last possible route for people to leave or food and medical supplies to enter.
Refugees from Chernihiv that escaped the siege and arrived in Poland this week spoke of widespread and devastating disaster, with bombs leveling at least two schools in the city center and strikes also hitting the stadium, museums and many homes.
They said that with utility companies stalling, people were taking water from Desna to drink and that strikes were killing people while waiting in line for food. Volodymyr Fedorovych, 77, said he escaped shortly after a bomb fell on a line of bread in which he had been standing a few moments earlier. He said the blast killed 16 people and injured dozens, blowing hands and feet.
The siege is so intense that some of those trapped can no longer muster the strength to fear, Kazmerczak said.
“The destroyed houses, the fires, the corpses in the streets, the huge aircraft bombs that did not explode in the yards no longer surprise anyone,” he said. “People are just tired of being scared and they don’t always go underground.”
With the invasion now in its second month, Russian forces have seemingly stalled on many fronts and are even losing ground previously from Ukrainian counterattacks, including Kiev. The Russians bombed the capital from the air, but did not capture or encircle the city. US and French defense officials say Russian troops appear to have taken up defensive positions outside Kyiv.
As Russia continues to strike and encircle civilian populations, from Chernihiv and Kharkiv in the north to Mariupol in the south, Ukrainian authorities on Saturday rejected statements by the Russian military suggesting it was planning to concentrate its remaining forces on whole of eastern Donbass, Ukraine. area from Ukrainian control. The area has been partly controlled by Russian-backed separatists since 2014.
“We can not believe Moscow’s statements because there are still many inaccuracies and lies on this side,” Markian Lubkivsky, an adviser to the Ukrainian defense minister, told the BBC. “That’s why we understand that the goal of (Russian President Vladimir) Putin is still the whole of Ukraine.”
This skepticism was highlighted hours later when explosions rocked Lviv, a city in western Ukraine about 72 kilometers from the Polish border, where an estimated 200,000 displaced Ukrainians have taken refuge.
Among them is Olana Ukrainets, a 34-year-old IT employee from Kharkov.
“When I came to Lviv, I was sure that all these alarms would have no effect,” Ukrainians told the AP from a bomb shelter after the blasts. “Sometimes when I listened to them at night, I just stayed in bed. Today, I changed my mind and had to hide every time. None of the cities in Ukraine is safe now.”
The strike came as US President Joe Biden was visiting Poland, which has received far more Ukrainian refugees than any other country.
The British Ministry of Defense said on Saturday that it does not expect a postponement for the citizens of the bombed cities of Ukraine soon.
“Russia will continue to use its heavy firepower in urban areas as it seeks to reduce its own already significant losses, at the cost of further civilian casualties,” the ministry said in a statement.
Previous bombings of hospitals and other civilian facilities, including a theater in Mariupol where Ukrainian authorities say a Russian airstrike believed to have killed 300 people last week, have already sparked war crimes allegations.
Maria Radionova, a 27-year-old resident of Mariupol, said she was standing at the entrance to the Mariupol Drama Theater when she was hit.
“We had debris, bricks and pieces of the wall falling on us,” Radionova told the AP from the town of Zaporizhzhia, where she and other residents were taken. “I saw from the stairs a man probably exploded from the explosion, and fell face down on the (shattered) glass. Nearby, there was an injured woman in a puddle of blood and this woman was trying to wake him up. “
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, appearing on video at the Doha Forum in Qatar on Saturday, compared the destruction of Mariupol with the destruction of Syria and Russia in the city of Aleppo.
The invasion has driven more than 10 million people from their homes, almost a quarter of Ukraine’s population. Of those, more than 3.7 million have fled the country altogether, according to the United Nations. Thousands of civilians are believed to have lost their lives.
In Chernihiv, hospitals are no longer operating and residents are cooking over fireplaces in the streets because the power has been cut off. Utility workers left behind are not enough to repair broken power cords and restore other basic services, and time has become blurred, the mayor said.
“We live without dates and days of the week,” Atroshenko told Ukrainian television.
Ever since a Russian bombing struck a Stalin-era cinema next to his 12-story apartment building, Kazmerchak, a linguist, has spent his nights in a bomb shelter. A Russian rocket also destroyed the hotel near his home.
“The walls were shaking so much,” he said. “I thought my house would collapse every minute and I would be left under the rubble.”
——
Andrea Rosa in Kharkov. Nebi Qena in Kyiv? Cara Anna in Lviv and Associated Press reporters around the world contributed to this report.
Getting in touch
Are you in Ukraine? Do you have a family in Ukraine? Are you or your family affected? Email [email protected]
Include your name, location, and contact information if you would like to speak to a CTV News reporter. Your comments can be used in a CTVNews.ca story.
