The war came to Chernihiv the same day the invasion began. Located just 70 kilometers from the border with Belarus, this city of 280,000 inhabitants was surrounded from February 24 to April 4 by Russian troops. The main access bridge over the Desna River is broken and can only be reached via the pontoon bridge installed by the military. The apparent normality in the center is broken when the pink silhouette of the Ukraine hotel emerges, with the last three floors destroyed by the impact of a missile.
A few minutes by car is Chornovola Street. The clock stopped on this street on March 3 at 12:15, the time Russian planes launched six missiles and killed 47 people. Two large blocks of flats and a hospital were seriously damaged. Seven months later, the residents of this area try to gradually recover normality, a task that is not easy. Valentina has returned to her apartment, but repairing the windows has cost her 95,000 hryvnias (2,400 euros in exchange), a fortune in the country in the minimum wage does not exceed 200 euros. «At first we put some plastic, but as soon as I could we closed it. Winter is coming and we don’t know if we will have heating or not, but we are Ukrainians and we are going to work and work to get ahead », she comments from the balcony of her house.
The cold is one of the great concerns of the neighbors. Thermometers will soon drop below zero degrees and the country is in a serious crisis due to Russia’s continued attacks on power plants. Kirilo Timoshenko, ‘number two’ in the office of the president, Volodímir Zelenski, called on citizens to “use energy intelligently in the morning, between 8:00 and 11:00 (local time), and in the afternoon, between 5:00 p.m. and 11:00 p.m. The need to reduce consumption may even lead to closing schools and returning to online teaching during the winter.
Leonid and his son Volodymyr did not have the luck of Valentina and their apartment was razed to the ground. It is the third of a ten-story tower in which there is not a single neighbor. «Now we come to rescue everything that can burn this winter, furniture, books, door and window frames… the winter will be long and the furniture burns well. Even if we finally have gas service, it’s too expensive and we won’t be able to afford it so I hope the furniture will burn well,” says Leonid, a former local factory driver. His son is the one who carries the heaviest pieces and lowers them to the door from the third floor.
“Help? The authorities came the first day and gave us a certificate stating the damage we have suffered. They promised that they would help us, but with the situation the country is experiencing, we assume that the help will not arrive until the war is over and we do not know when that will be”, says Volodímir. Father and son do not have a minute to lose. They load their blue Lada 1200 with the wood and leave this ghostly place that was their home until February.
The threat from the north
The front seems far away from Chernihiv now, but everyone knows that the threat is still present and very close. Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko declared a state of alert and has deployed his forces along the border. Vladimir Putin’s ally warns of the “terrorist threat” and “therefore, we started a joint defense procedure between the Belarusian army and units of the Russian Federation.”
The Ukrainian counteroffensive is focused on the east and south of the country, where the pro-Russian authorities have even asked Moscow to help evacuate civilians. Russia, for its part, has demonstrated its ability to strike anywhere in the territory. In addition to cruise missiles, drone attacks have been repeated in the last week and Defense Minister Alexei Reznikov assured that the enemy has “around 300 units” of these kamikaze drones supplied by Iran. According to Rezkinov, Russia would be in talks with the Islamic Republic to buy “thousands more devices.”
On the old Lenin Avenue, renamed Myru, Sergei follows the latest war news on his cell phone and is worried about Lukashenko’s movements. “I don’t think he will take the step of crossing the border and reinforcing Russia, but if he does, we are waiting for him here. If we can get the Russians to back down, we will do the same with the Belarusians, there is no doubt.