BELOW SUPERNAV drop zone ⇩

PHOTOS: War’s toll felt by children of Ukraine

Serafim, 3, looks at the body of Ukrainian Army captain Anton Sydorov, 35, killed in eastern Ukraine, during his funeral, in Kyiv, Ukraine, Tuesday, Feb. 22, 2022. (AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti)

MAIN AREA TOP drop zone ⇩

MAIN AREA TOP drop zone ⇩

(AP) — What has war looked like for the children of Ukraine?

For many, it has meant sheltering in basements and subway stations while Russian forces attack cities and street fights rage. For others, it has meant a scramble to escape, leaving homes and fathers, taking trains and buses or walking for miles with their families in hopes of crossing into a safer country.

Some children have been killed or injured in the conflict. One 6-year-old girl in the southern city of Mariupol was hit during shelling. She was raced to the hospital in an ambulance but died as her parents, nurses and doctors wept.

Babies were born into a world of tumult. At the Okhmadet Children’s Hospital in the middle of the capital, tiny twin newborn brothers were swaddled in blankets on the basement floor. Across the country, in Mariupol, Kateryna Suharokova gave birth to a son, Makar, in the basement of a maternity hospital converted into a medical ward and used as a bomb shelter.

Children too young to understand the reasons and history of the conflict with Russia still saw it come home. One 3-year-old boy in Kyiv stared quietly at the open casket at the funeral of a Ukrainian soldier.

And at the cancer hospital, young patients in the basement held up signs in English for a visiting photographer: “Stop War.”

Across Ukraine and in refugee shelters across the borders, parents have struggled to comfort their children. Mothers rock them on subway platforms or carry them for miles in the cold. They find diversions for nights spent underground — books, toys, phones, pets. At one border station in Poland, refugees were met by boxes of donated clothes and toys.

War in Ukraine

Copyright 2024 Nexstar Media Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed

Site Settings Survey

 

MAIN AREA MIDDLE drop zone ⇩

Trending on NewsNation

MAIN AREA BOTTOM drop zone ⇩

tt

KC Chiefs parade shooting: 1 dead, 21 shot including 9 kids | Morning in America

Witness of Chiefs parade shooting describes suspect | Banfield

Kansas City Chiefs parade shooting: Mom of 2 dead, over 20 shot | Banfield

WWE star Ashley Massaro 'threatened' by board to keep quiet about alleged rape: Friend | Banfield

Friend of WWE star: Ashley Massaro 'spent hours' sobbing after alleged rape | Banfield

Sunny

la

67°F Sunny Feels like 67°
Wind
7 mph SW
Humidity
44%
Sunrise
Sunset

Tonight

Partly cloudy. Low near 50F. Winds NNW at 5 to 10 mph.
50°F Partly cloudy. Low near 50F. Winds NNW at 5 to 10 mph.
Wind
6 mph NNW
Precip
10%
Sunset
Moon Phase
Waxing Gibbous