He fled from Kiev to the border, has not heard from his parents since Saturday and has received videos from his childhood friends in which Russian soldiers kill civilians in Ivankiv
“He is determined to travel for his parents, whom he has not heard from since Saturday, but we ask him to be safe and that we help him come to Donostia.” Hennadii is currently hidden in Lviv, one of the Ukrainian towns closest to the border with Poland, just 30 kilometers from it but a world away due to the enormous traffic jams with thousands and thousands of compatriots who are also fleeing from war. He escaped by car from Kiev when Russia began its attack and communicates when his phone allows it with his “family” from San Sebastian, with whom he shared the summer as a “child from Chernobyl” for more than ten years.
Hennadii is now 28 years old and was born in Ivankiv, a town of just over 10,000 inhabitants located north of Kiev. The municipality is located just over 50 kilometers from Chernobyl, one of the first areas through which the Russian army began to advance on its way to the Ukrainian capital. The satellite images of the advance of the huge convoy of Vladimir Putin’s troops are taken over Ivankiv, which is being razed to the ground by these military forces.
“He was running errands with the car and with almost what he had on he had to flee,” explains from Donostia the family with whom Hennadii spent his summers as a child in Gipuzkoa. Now they hope that when possible he can cross the border into Poland, although for this he needs a document that allows him to leave as a refugee, otherwise he could be called to fight on the war front. Hennadii lived in the capital, Kiev, while his family and childhood friends were still in Ivankiv, a town devastated by Russian troops and where dozens of civilians have died.
Hennadii’s parents took refuge in the basement of some neighbors and since last Saturday the young man has no contact with them. According to various sources, for several days Ivankiv has been without electricity or water after the passage of the Russian army, which has destroyed bridges, public buildings and has shot at civilians. This is confirmed by Hennadii himself, who recently received a terrifying video by WhatsApp from Vadim, one of his childhood friends.
“Oleg is dead”
“Everyone has to see this,” Hennadii wrote to his family from San Sebastian this Sunday, bouncing the video recorded by his friend Vadim. It shows how Vadim and his father Oleg drive a van back to Ivankiv after transporting some neighbors to Chernobyl to safety. At one point Vadim and Oleg’s vehicle comes to a stop and is fired upon by Russian soldiers. Both, along with their dog, try to leave the vehicle and flee, however Vadim’s father is unable to escape the ambush alive. “Oleg is dead”, he explains in the messages from him Hennadii.
After seeing these images, Hennadii doubts whether to go to safety or drive to his village to go for his parents. «He has been sleeping in his car since Wednesday, without money, clothes or food. We are sending him money from here so that he can leave the country and we will wait for him when he goes to Poland. We ask him to be safe and not to return to that area », narrates the family from San Sebastian from Hennadii, who trusts that he will soon be able to escape from the country.
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