‘Learning to live in the new war mode’

by Roman Rukomeda*

The Russian military campaign has lost its dynamics, so the main tactics of the Russian war criminals are terrorism against the civilian population, writes Roman Rukomeda.

The fifth day of Russian aggression against Ukraine ended with the first round of negotiations between Ukraine and Russia, with Belarus on the border of three countries. The ‘results’ of these negotiations were the worst rocket attack on Kyiv and other locations with Iskander ballistic missiles that killed and wounded many Ukrainians.

The general impression of the day is that Russian war criminals began massively to destroy civilian infrastructure in big Ukrainian cities.

There are terrible videos of these massive rocket and artillery attacks on Kharkiv and Chernigiv, where tens of people were killed, and more than a hundred were wounded. In Chernihiv, an old historical place, a lot of damage was caused to cultural buildings.

The Ukrainian town of Mariupol, which stands on the shores of the Azov sea, is heavily bombarded by Russian artillery with many civilian casualties.

It is needed to say that Russian aggressors had already killed tens of children and many hundreds of civilians since the beginning of the war. They destroy kindergartens, schools, hospitals and energy stations. They try to do maximum damage to people and civilian infrastructure to breed terror in the hearts of the Ukrainian people. The effect is the opposite.

In the Kyiv region, Russian war criminals destroyed the museum of Ukrainian culture with the most extensive collection of the famous Ukrainian painter Mariya Pryymachenko. Luckily the most significant amount of original paintings were not lost.

The Ukrainian capital is learning to live in the new war mode. Since Monday morning, the population was allowed to visit food stores that are opened and are delivering to people basic food and drinks. Many stores did it for free, trying to help suffering people. Many volunteering activities take place among youth and small and medium businesses.

The real heroes are the people working in the city services, such as energy engineers and city transport drivers, who continue to do their everyday work to supply normal life in the most prominent Ukrainian city, providing people with electricity, water, connection, and food.

The Russian military campaign has lost its dynamics, so the main tactics of Russian war criminals are terrorism against the civilian population. Because of it, about 350,000 Ukrainians have already left their homes.

Some small towns in Donbas close to the front line, such as Schastya (Happiness – in Ukrainian), are almost entirely destroyed. Ukrainian armed forces are trying to help people evacuate under constant rocket attacks from Russian aggressors.

The main political message that Ukraine’s President Zelenskiy sent to the EU is a request for EU membership through the extra-fast exceptional procedure. The Ukrainian nation that is deterring the biggest global nuclear terrorist state has deserved it by its heroism and blood. Now the ball is in Europe’s camp.

*Ukrainian political analyst. This is his fourth account of Russia’s invasion into Ukraine, which he succeeded to send to EURACTIV despite limited internet access

**first published in: www.euractiv.com