“No mother should have to watch her daughter die. No mother should have to rebuild her daughter’s body. She was killed, my heart was broken, our family’s heart was broken.”
Vera Ivanova is inconsolable in her grief.
His daughter, Nataliya, was killed in a bombing raid in Sievierodonetsk, one of the two cities along with Lysychansk, which the Russians are trying to capture to complete the capture of the Luhansk region in fierce battles in eastern Ukraine.
Having failed to capture Kyiv or Kharkiv, the focus of Vladimir Putin’s forces is now on the east of the country. And there they are making gains, with Ukrainian forces outnumbered and repulsed, despite strong resistance.
Nataliya Ivanova was with her family at the vast Azot Chemical Plant, which has become a haven for hundreds of people in a city facing months of missiles and airstrikes and rounds of artillery. Death and destruction are massive. More than 1,600 people have died in the fighting, and only 2,000 remain in the devastated pre-war population of 110,000.
The ferocity of the assault on Sievierodonetsk and Lysychansk has increased since Russian forces suffered heavy losses during a failed attempt to cross the Seversky Donets River earlier this month. There seems to be resentment in the goal of civilian areas now.
Vera Ivanova, 73, whose daughter Nataliya was killed in a Russian bombing raid, along with her twin grandchildren Maxim and Oleksandr, 14, and son-in-law Vladislav.
(Ivan Kharyniak)
About 80 percent of the city’s buildings have been affected, and in some neighborhoods almost none have been left. Residents have largely retired underground, rarely venturing out of the occasional communal meals.
Nataliya was killed along with three other people gathered outside the plant for cooking and eating in the afternoon. The attack was scheduled, survivors say, to inflict maximum casualties.
“A woman and a mother were taken away,” says a weeping 73-year-old Vera. “Look at the boys, look at her husband. We are all suffering.
“We can’t even stay at his funeral, we have to leave, the church will bury him. All this suffering because of a madman and all those people who follow him. “
Natalya’s 14-year-old twin sons Maxim and Oleksandr sit on the floor with their arms around each other. Her husband, Vladislav Golovin, is standing next to them, looking ahead.
After a moment, he shakes his head. “She was a good woman, my wife. I miss her. I don’t know why we were bombed. They say someone directed them, but why would anyone do that? Her voice fades.
Police have arrested a man accused of being in contact with the enemy before the attack. He allegedly informed the Russians of a gathering of people in the open air: a short time later the bombing began.
“We have enough evidence to show that her husband has been in contact with the Russians,” said Pavel Landik, the investigating officer. “There are others involved; let’s catch them.
“They bombed this place when there were a lot of people outside. It wasn’t a military target; the idea was to create panic among the people, to create terror.”
A hole in the ground where a Russian missile struck near a residential block in Luhansk, eastern Ukraine
(Kim Sengupta)
Nicola Ivanov also died in the airstrike. Her husband, Mykola, suffered serious injuries to her legs. He was evacuated. His son, Sergei, is trying to find where they took him.
“My dad has had to move very quickly and has no documents with him,” Sergei says. “I need to find him. He was ill before the injuries and I’m very worried about him; I could be unconscious in some hospital.”
Sergei is a giant man. A former professional boxer, he had been a teammate of Vitali Klitschko, the former world heavyweight champion who is now in the international spotlight as a wartime mayor of Kyiv.
Sergei says Klitschko wanted to fight him before his fight with Lennox Lewis for the undisputed world title: the “Battle of the Titans” in Los Angeles in 2003. Lewis won by technical knockout when the fight stopped in the sixth round. due to a severe cut above Klitschko’s left eye.
“Vitali was worried about Lennox Lewis and asked me to train with him because he had a similar style,” he recalls. “Who knows, maybe he would have won if the fight had continued. In any case, he has become a very good mayor ever since. ”
He reflects: “I have been boxing since I was a child. I always felt that I could always take care of myself, my family. But now, with what happened to my mother and father, I feel helpless. ”
Former boxer Sergei Ivanov is looking for his father after a Russian airstrike that also killed his mother
(Ivan Kharyniak)
Sievierodonetsk and Lysychansk are experiencing continuous bombardment, making them extremely difficult to reach, with field and village routes needed to avoid tank battles on the main roads.
One of the two bridges crossing the Seversky Donets River to Sievierodonetsk has been destroyed, the other is under constant bombardment. Residents and Ukrainian forces inside the city are facing an almost continuous artillery fire. Water and electricity have been cut off for more than a month.
The question for Ukraine’s political and military leadership is whether forces should be withdrawn and civilians evacuated. On Friday, the governor of the region, Serhiy Haidai, said that a tactical withdrawal might be necessary. President Volodymyr Zelensky is said to be considering options.
Of the two cities, Sievierodonetsk is in imminent danger, at the very real risk of being surrounded and besieged as happened in Mariupol. What happened provoked the anger of the soldiers who had defended him until they were forced to finally surrender to Russian forces.
Nicolai, an infantry sergeant, can see the approaching danger. “We don’t want to repeat, we don’t want the Azot plant in Sievierodonetsk to become the new Azovstal plant in Mariupol,” he says. “But at the end of the day, it’s a political decision. We will continue with what we do.”
Maryana Bezuhla, a Member of Parliament, is in Lysychansk to observe the conditions at the forefront as a member of the parliamentary committee on national security, defense and intelligence. She does not say whether Sievierodonetsk could become another Mariupol, but wants to stress the need for Western nations to accelerate the arms supplies needed to counter the Russian offensive.
Maryana Bezuhla, Ukrainian MP, speaking in Lysychansk
(Kim Sengupta)
Wearing body armor (there are continuous incoming bombings as we speak) Ms Bezuhla adds: “The issue of evacuation has been raised, but it is not something I can say anything about now.
“To continue defending Ukrainian territory, we need our allies to give us the weapons our soldiers need. We also need much more ammunition; our soldiers must be very limited to firing due to lack of supplies.
“What happens in the Donbas will obviously affect what happens in Ukraine, so it is essential to get these supplies. I have seen what our forces are facing, and also what the people in these areas are facing. “I want to thank the emergency services for everything they are doing for the people here.”
Police have become the largest emergency service on the Sievierodonetsk and Lysychansk front lines. They help deliver food and water, evacuate wounded civilians and soldiers, and bring the growing number of dead to tanks and cemeteries.
A quarter of a mile from where Ms Bezuhla was speaking, a missile struck a food distribution center and police rushed out of their sandbag station.
A huge hole has been made through the wall of what was once a concert hall. A car used to deliver food is charred by fire.
Some inside were waiting for supplies while others were evacuated.
Coming out of the rubble, 69-year-old Oleksandr Voychevkiyiy is adamant that he and his wife will not leave. As the explosions continue to close, he acknowledges that the situation is dangerous, “but this is our home, we have nowhere else to go, we will stay and see what happens.”
Inside the damaged building, Nadiazd Samohrin also insists he will stay in Lysychansk. “I have older parents, both 77 years old, they can’t travel and I won’t leave them,” he said. “Anyway, this is a part of Ukraine, and I don’t want to leave a part of my own country, expelled by the Russians.”
One of the two bridges across the Seversky Donets River to Sievierodonetsk has been destroyed
(Kim Sengupta)
Not everyone agrees. A group of women mostly rally to protest in anger. “It’s the Ukrainians themselves who are bombing, it’s a lie to say it’s the Russians,” said one of them. “It’s NATO, the Americans, the British, they’re killing us,” said another.
Ms. Samohrin tries to answer, but leaves after being pushed. “These people are angry and scared. They believe in propaganda and rumors, it doesn’t make sense to try to have a discussion with them,” he says. “You can see what the Russians are doing in this city that they are supposed to liberate.”
A missile, with its fins outstretched, is embedded in the pavement near the distribution center. Later, another hit a residential block, razing a massive bunker.
Elena Kovalova, Tatiana Salopan and Raisa Bogachov, in their sixties, are sitting on a bench watching a family cut down a tree for fuel.
“We have nothing, no gas, no electricity, no water, no money,” said Ms. Kovalova. “My husband’s heart condition has worsened due to the attack. We are on the eighth floor, there are no elevators and he cannot go up and down the stairs. So he has been trapped there for months. We are now living day in and day out, hoping we’ll survive. ”
Ms. Salopan’s hearing has been damaged by missile attacks on buildings. “The good thing is that the bombs don’t sound so loud right now,” she said.