The Ukrainian city of Luhansk is rocked daily by heavy bombing raids by the Russian army. Pensioner Yuri Krassnikov stands next to the charred remains of a bungalow in the eastern Ukrainian city of Lysychansk and describes the shocking situation.
Many blocks of flats in Luhansk are scarred by the war. The air is clouded by a cloud of ash rising from a nearby burned-out technical college.
“Every day there are bomb attacks, every day something burns,” says 70-year-old Yuriy Krasnikov, leaning on a walking stick. “There is nobody to help me,” he complains. He tried to go to the city hall, “but there is no one there, everyone ran away”.
Thousands of civilians have fled the neighboring cities of Sieverodonetsk and Lysychansk in recent weeks. Above all, older people and their carers as well as people who don’t have the money for a new start in a foreign country have stayed behind.
19-year-old Ivan Sosnin stayed in Lysychansk because of his frail grandmother, he says. “This is our home. It’s all we know. We grew up here. Where else should we go?” His family has no money to stay anywhere else longer.
Lysychansk and Sieverodonetsk are the last cities of the Luhansk region that Russia has not yet conquered. According to Ukrainian sources, Sievjerodonetsk was already largely under Russian control on Thursday. Lysychansk, across the Donetsk River, is bombed daily by Russian troops.
Serhij Lipko stands in front of his badly damaged house. Despite the advancing Russian troops, he wanted to stay in Lysychansk, he says. “In our country, you work your whole life to have a roof over your head. That’s why we don’t want to go somewhere where we don’t have it,” says Lipko. Many people would not have wanted to leave their hard-earned home ownership.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy spoke on Wednesday evening of a “very hard, very difficult battle” for the two cities. Luhansk governor Serhiy Gaiday said Lysychansk was under “heavy and chaotic” bombardment. He accused Russian troops of “deliberately” targeting hospitals and centers for the distribution of humanitarian aid.
The capture of Sieverodonetsk and Lysychansk would allow Moscow to advance towards the major city of Kramatorsk in the Donetsk region. This would bring the Kremlin a decisive step closer to its goal of completely conquering the Donbass.
At a sparsely stocked weekly market in Lyssychansk, Wadym Schwez does not want to give up hope despite the gloomy prospects. “I have no idea what’s going to happen tomorrow. We don’t know if we will survive,” he says. “Of course, we hope for the best.” Fundraising campaign for Ukraine aid: near the border with Poland, an alliance from Torgelow takes care of Ukrainian children
