Ukraine war etched on faces of wounded, bereaved
Missing part of his leg after a Russian bombardment, a man lay dazed in a stretcher as civilians helped an EMT bustle him away for treatment. Another sat stunned on a park bench, a strap cinched tightly around his leg just above a long, bloody gash. At a hospital, bandages shrouded a woman’s shoulder after she underwent surgery for wounds sustained during the shelling of her village.
The arrival of Eastern Orthodox Easter this week brought no respite from war to Ukraine some 60 days into Russia’s invasion, and the pain and suffering continued to be etched on the faces of the wounded, the bereaved and those fearful for what may yet be to come.
Worshippers wait in line to kiss what represents the coffin of Jesus Christ during Easter Orthodox Christian celebrations at Saints Peter and Garrison church in Lviv, western Ukraine, Friday, April 22, 2022. (AP Photo/Francisco Seco)
A woman lights candles during an Easter service at a church in Bucha on the outskirts of Kyiv, Ukraine, Sunday, April 24, 2022. (AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti)
In Irpin, on the outskirts of Kyiv, a wiry gravedigger shoveled earth from the ground surrounded by hundreds of other new tombs adorned with flowers and photos of the deceased.
In the village of Ozera, two women embraced in the street during a funeral for the husband of one of them. The man was taken from his home
by Russian soldiers the previous month and later found shot dead miles away.
At a church in nearby Bucha, where evidence of torture and mass killings surfaced after Russian forces departed earlier this month, a woman sobbed openly during a church service on Easter Sunday.
And in Chernihiv, a firefighter paused to sit in a child’s swing set and contemplate the debris from a building destroyed by a Russian bomb.
There were also signs of a people girding themselves for more — particularly in Ukraine's ravaged east, after Moscow refocused its war effort there.
At a hospital in Kramatorsk, workers pinned a patient’s X-ray to dozens of sandbags lining a window to guard against bombardment.
In the Donetsk region, a Ukrainian serviceman grimaced as he squeezed himself down into a tank to perform maintenance.
And in Pokrovsk, also in the east, emergency crews labored to hoist an older and disabled woman onto a train for evacuation to a hopefully safer part of the country.
Lead photo: An emergency worker is helped by locals to carry an injured man missing a part of his leg to an ambulance following a Russian bombardment in Kharkiv, Ukraine, Wednesday, April 27, 2022. (AP Photo/Felipe Dana)
Text from AP News story, AP PHOTOS: Ukraine war etched on faces of wounded, bereaved.