Ukraine News

KYIV, Ukraine—The young man never told anyone he was going to war. The 20-year-old student at Kyiv’s Taras Shevchenko National University slipped away in June 2014 to join a civilian paramilitary group fighting in eastern Ukraine. The young man, whose name was Sviatoslav Horbenko, was a star pupil at the university’s Institute of Philology, where…

KURAKHOVO, Ukraine—They all have a reason to go home. For some, it’s to reunite with friends and family, to regain their dignity, or to find a job so they can afford to pay the rent and buy groceries. Others simply want to rejoin the lives they left behind to escape the Russian artillery and rockets….

KYIV, Ukraine—The shaky cease-fire in eastern Ukraine has reached a “tipping point,” a high-level Ukrainian government official says. The official’s comments underscore how geopolitical events—from the war in Syria to the rise of nationalist parties across Europe—have tested international resolve to maintain sanctions on Russia. “There is no alternative” to the current cease-fire, the official…

KYIV, Ukraine—More than two years after a Russian surface-to-air missile shot down a civilian airliner over eastern Ukraine, the embattled region remains a de facto no-fly zone for both civilian and military aircraft. On Wednesday, an international investigative team concluded there was “no doubt” the Buk missile that shot down Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 on…

KYIV, Ukraine—In Mariupol, a Ukrainian port city on the Sea of Azov only about 10 miles from the front lines, you can frequently hear artillery exploding from inside the city. Sometimes it sounds like tree branches knocking in the wind. Sometimes it’s loud enough to rattle windows. I was at dinner with a group of…

KYIV, Ukraine—There is a memorial to murdered Ukrainian journalists on Khreshchatyk, Kyiv’s central boulevard. It’s a simple, nondescript metal plaque flanked by flowers on the side of a building. Some of the names are faded now, worn down by the years and the elements. The names date from 1992, the first year after Ukraine gained…

MARIUPOL, Ukraine— For more than two years, Ukraine’s military has been fighting a ground war against a combined force of pro-Russian separatists and Russian regulars in the Donbas, Ukraine’s embattled southeastern territory. As Ukraine prepares for the 25th anniversary of its independence from the Soviet Union this Wednesday, the ongoing war in the Donbas highlights…

KYIV, Ukraine—As part of a prisoner swap, Russia has released jailed Ukrainian army helicopter pilot and Member of Parliament Nadia Savchenko, who became a national symbol of Ukrainian resistance to Russia since her capture nearly two years ago. “This is good news for Ukraine,” said Alexander, a 21-year-old student who was out celebrating Savchenko’s release…

KYIV, Ukraine—The sniper’s bullet went into the head of the man standing in front of Valentyn Onyshchenko. Blood and brain matter sprayed into Onyshchenko’s face with enough force to break the then-21-year-old’s eyeglasses. “Like a robot” he weaved through the thousands of protesters gathered in central Kyiv for the February 2014 revolution. He went to…

KYIV, Ukraine—In a televised address Sunday, Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk announced he would step down Tuesday, marking the end of a two-month-long political crisis. “We cannot allow destabilization of the executive branch during a war,” Yatsenyuk said. Ukrainian forces are still battling combined Russian-separatist forces in a 2-year-old war that has killed more than…

LOBACHEVE, Ukraine—War is absurd sometimes. The SUV clambered along the pothole-speckled dirt road, which was now more mud than dirt in the wake of melting snow and spring rains. The driver, a 30-year-old Ukrainian soldier named Andriy, held a pistol in his steering hand as he navigated through no man’s land near the separatist-controlled city…

SHCHASTYA, Ukraine—The late winter weather in Ukraine alternates among frigid, cool, snow, and rain—teasing the arrival of spring. The 2-year-old war, which has ravaged eastern Ukraine, killing more than 10,000 and displacing more than 1 million, is as fickle as the weather—teasing the possibility of peace without ever achieving it. Both sides of the conflict renewed…

KYIV, Ukraine—Vadym Krypychenko was sure he was going to die. His vehicle had broken down along the front lines in eastern Ukraine near the village of Verkhniotroitske. It was Aug. 10, 2015, only four days before the end of his military service commitment and his scheduled return home. Krypychenko, a private in the Ukrainian army’s…

KYIV, Ukraine—Ivona Kostyna couldn’t leave the war even if she wanted to. It was December 2014 and, at age 18,  the civilian volunteer was delivering supplies to Ukrainian troops stationed in the front-line town of Debaltseve. Her car broke down, and in the six days it took to make repairs she lived among the soldiers….

KYIV, Ukraine—The two-year-old Ukraine war has hit a grim milestone amid the longest and most durable lull in fighting since the conflict began. Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko last week said 2,269 Ukrainian soldiers have died since the conflict in eastern Ukraine began in spring 2014. That toll almost matches the 2,381 American troops killed during roughly…