It was afternoon, a residential neighborhood, a time to get things done. But there is nothing routine about life near the front line in Ukraine. Kharkiv, the country’s second largest city and a short drive from the Russian border, lives with the low thunder of distant artillery and the hideous explosions of shells exploding much closer to home. Natalia Kolesnik, like other residents, has learned to live with the risks. Then, in a grassy yard on a hot and sweaty Thursday, the bombing caught her. It was one of three bodies in the garbage dump. One body looked unrecognizable. The second, in a torn yellow dress and a deflated blue slipper, stood next to a shattered wooden bench. Beside him, there was a box of half-eaten fruit, cherries and apples, speckled with blood. Inside a wallet left on the counter, a cell phone rang. Kolesnik was close. Her husband, Victor, arrived in shock. He didn’t want to let her go. He patted her head. “Dad, this is it,” said Olexander’s son, watching first responders wait to close the bag. “She’s dead. Get up.” “You do not understand;” his father asked. “What I dont understand;” said the son. “This is my mother. Daddy, please. Daddy, please.” Kneeling down, Victor hugged what was left of his wife, one hand resting on her shoulder, his jaw pressed against the crack in her face. He took her left hand and repositioned it, covering it with his own. The plea continued. Victor nudged his son’s hand again. “Dad, go.” “I can not go”. “Look, you’re covered in blood. People have to drag her along.” Victor began to close the bag himself and then the first responders took over. As neighbors watched from the edge of a field, and as authorities began their now-routine hunt for shrapnel, Victor was left alone on a bench to cry. “People suffered, for what?” Neighbor Sergei Pershin said as he watched medics tending to several wounded. “It’s awful. I’m so sick of it. Every night you wake up 10 times, wait for it to be over, wait for them to start shooting. What are the bastards doing? There are apartment buildings here.” The story continues It was just one day in Kharkiv, where hundreds have been killed in 19 weeks of war. As Russia regroups its troops to try to seize more territory in eastern Ukraine, it’s safe to say more dead will come. As of Sunday, the United Nations human rights office had verified at least 4,889 civilians killed across Ukraine since Russia’s invasion, a figure it said likely represented a huge number.
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