While Putin’s military is attacking Kiev, a Ukrainian actress lives there new York spent Friday morning on the phone with his cousin Irina, who was in the Ukrainian capital, gathering her two daughters and embarking on an eight-hour trip to Poland.
Irina’s 55-year-old husband plans to leave them at the eastern border and then return to Kiev to fight to protect his homeland from Russia.
“No, I can’t do without you,” Irina shouted at her husband.
“I will not leave, I will fight for my homeland,” he replied.
A cousin in New York, 45-year-old Elena Sobina, recalled the story in an interview with DailyMail.com on Friday and said she felt helpless as family and friends suddenly found themselves in the battlefields of Russia’s war against Ukraine.
Elena Sobina, a 45-year-old New Yorker, told DailyMail.com she felt helpless as family and friends were in the battle zones of Russia’s war against Ukraine.
Sobina spent Friday on the phone with her cousin Irina, who was in Ukraine, gathering her two daughters and embarking on an eight-hour trip to Poland.
“Sanctions don’t stop this evil,” said Sobina, who lives in Upper Manhattan. – They need real help, military help.
Ukraine is struggling today to retain control of its capital, while US intelligence warns that Russia hopes a lightning attack on the city is the quickest way to win the war and regain control of Moscow’s country. Part of this plan is to encircle Kiev, besiege and take over one of the two intact airports.
Sobina is on a family vacation in Panama this week, but spends her phone trip with panicked relatives in Ukraine, including her cousin, whom she considers a sister.
“She tried to be strong yesterday,” Sobina said. “She is no longer strong. She said she could not stop trembling.
She said Irina had started her day struggling to get money for her evacuation, but the banks were closed. They wanted to fly out of Ukraine, but it was impossible.
“They were trying to get to the airport, but she said there were tanks and missiles in the city threatening to shoot down planes,” she said. “The whole airport is off.”
Traveling was their only option. They went to a friend’s house to fix their tires before heading to the border.
“It’s really hard to drive because all the roads are full of cars and it’s hard to get gas,” Sobina said.
The Ukrainian president has ordered military mobilization and banned men between the ages of 18 and 60 from leaving, but Sobina said her ex-military husband plans to return independently.
She is proud of him.
“Good people, they will not leave,” Sobina said. “They are ready to fight.”
People wait in traffic jam as they leave Kharkiv after Russian President Vladimir Putin authorizes military operation in eastern Ukraine
Firefighters put out a fire in a residential building damaged by a rocket on Friday in Kiev, Ukraine
Traffic jams in Kiev, Ukraine on Thursday as residents flee the capital
Sobina is also talking to her 80-year-old aunt, who lives in Chernihiv on the northern border, which is also under attack.
“She says she hears gunfire and her building and windows are shaking,” Sobina recalled. “Everyone is told to go to the basement, but she really can’t move well.”
Just last month, Sobina visited Chernigov, where she celebrated the New Year with her aunt and other relatives.
She had planned to return earlier this month to an apartment she owns outside of Kiev, but was canceled due to an impending threat she never thought would materialize. She also postponed her trip to Chernobyl in May, where she grew up.
Russian forces have taken control of the city’s nuclear power plant.
“When I heard about Chernobyl, it hurt me the most,” Sobina said tearfully. “I was strong, but when I heard they took my land.”
She stopped to gather herself.
“If hatred ever gets into my heart, I try to take it away because hating people is the worst thing,” she told DailyMail.com. “But right now I’m feeling so crazy about Russia.”
She said she refused to even talk to acquaintances who supported Russia and its actions, and criticized a friend who dismissed the war as “only Ukraine and Russia”.
“Putin is not a man with a brain,” Sobina said. She criticized President Biden’s leadership of the crisis, likening it to his evacuation of US troops from Afghanistan last year.
“I said it’s not just Ukraine and Russia, how can you not understand that?” Sobina argued. “The whole world is involved in this. We are talking about a crazy person. We don’t know what he will do. Do you know how much uranium there is in Chernobyl, buried? It is enough to destroy the whole planet.
“I want people to understand the danger and hope to fight for this man,” she continued.
She said sanctions would not stop the aggression.
“Putin is not a man with a brain,” Sobina said. “He does not care about all these sanctions. All he wants is to take. He thinks of himself as Napoleon. It must be stopped.
She criticized President Biden’s leadership of the crisis, likening it to his evacuation of US troops from Afghanistan last year.
“My opinion, and I’m not afraid to say it anymore, is that Biden is a very weak man,” she said. “She seems to be afraid to fight. I have a feeling that Trump was more aggressive towards all kinds of evil, and Biden is weak. Putin is taking advantage of a president who will not argue about it.