The first of June is traditionally celebrated as Children’s Day in Ukraine, but this day was not supposed to free the population from the brutality of war either. A nine-year-old girl ran to a bomb shelter in Kyiv today. She was with her mother (34), and the mother (33) of another child. The three fled from ten Russian rockets that were sent towards Ukraine in the morning hours. The rockets are said to have been shot to pieces before they hit the ground, but the remains came from the sky at great speed. The women and the girl arrived at the bomb room. The door was closed. They hammered on the door, but before anyone inside could react, they were knocked to the ground by tremendous force, hit by the rocket debris from above. One of the women who was killed in Kyiv on the first of June is taken away. Photo: VALENTYN OGIRENKO / Reuters A chair The police quickly cordoned off the area. On the inside of the barriers, the nine-year-old’s grandfather squatted for hours. He watched over the body of his grandson. Sorrowful and silent. The grief is double, because the daughter also died. Someone eventually brought him a chair. Rescuers approached the grandfather, but there were no long conversations. He just sat there, head bowed, looking at his grandson’s covered body. The photographer is also at a loss for words, but the picture he took of his grandfather makes a strong impression on many. It is now widely shared on social media. Widower This was also the day Yaroslav Riabchuk became a widower. The family of three came together to the bomb room, which is located between a kindergarten and a clinic. – People knocked on the door. They knocked for a long time. There were women and children. No one opened, Riabchuk tells Suspilne media. In trying to get people on the inside to react, he went the opposite way. – Just at that moment it happened. Something came flying. I don’t know what it was, but it was fragments or something like that, says Yarislav. The daughter survived, but the wife died. The wife of Yaroslav Riabchuk was killed outside one of Kyiv’s largest bomb shelters. Photo: VALENTYN OGIRENKO / Reuters – A crime A witness tells Suspilne that the guard in the bomb room had locked himself in the bomb room with his family, and that he must have been drunk. Interior Minister Ihor Klymenko reacts strongly to the incident. He believes that the war has lasted so long that public servants should have been able to map and clean up challenges on the ground long ago, to ensure people’s safety. It must have happened before, that people are locked out, or thrown out of bomb shelters. – Closed bomb shelters during the war do not just happen out of indifference. It is a crime, says Klymenko, according to CNN. There is double grief for this grandmother who also lost her daughter. The nine-year-old and his mother came to a closed bomb shelter. They were killed by remnants of Russian rockets allegedly shot down by Ukrainian forces. Photo: VALENTYN OGIRENKO / Reuters Play and balloons In April, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees informed that 8,451 people had lost their lives after Russia went to full-scale war against Ukraine in February 2022. – At least 501 children have been killed, said UNICEF director Catherine Russell. Moreover, all children in Ukraine have experienced significant trauma in the 16 months the war has lasted. Before the war, the first of June was the day that the little ones in Ukraine looked forward to. On the children’s day, they got to frolic in concerts, outdoor play and balloons. This year, five-year-old Szvinka spent Children’s Day decorating her father’s grave. He died in battle. Five-year-old Szvinka lays flowers on her father’s grave in Lviv. Ruslan Siksoy died in battle. Photo: YURIY DYACHYSHYN / AFP
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Nine-year-old killed on Children’s Day in Ukraine – news Urix – Foreign news and documentaries
